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HOW TO 



HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND 



PREVENT CHICKS 



FROM 



DYING IN iss SHELL 



BY 

MRS. REBECCA JOHNSON 

Maxwell, Iowa 



[Revised Second Edition] 



The L. R. Shepherd Publishing Co. 

Maxwell, Iowa 

1906 



LIBRARY of C0N6RESS 

One Copy Received 

MAR 29 1906 

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7 COPY B. 



Copyrighted 1905 
Copyrighted 1906 

BY 

Mrs. Rebecca Johnson 

Maxwell, Iowa 




INTRODUCTORY 

IO THE READER: I will tell you how I came to write this 
book. In the year 1882 I took up poultry raising as a money 
making proposition, believing there was more money to be 
made for the capital invested than in any other line of busi- 
ness and am still of the same belief, but I became dissatisfied 
with the slow way of raising chickens with hens. I had read that chicks 
could be hatched by artificial incubation, but I had never seen an incu- 
bator, and knew nothing of the natural laws of incubation, but if one 
wants to learn they must investigate, so I went to work. I placed a ther- 
mometer under a setting hen every day for three weeks and found first the 
temperature at which she kept her eggs each day during the whole hatch. 
The hen from which I was taking lessons I.set on the porch near the win- 
dow, where I was doing my spring sewing. I watched her closely that I 
might know how many times she turned her eggs during the day. She 
turned them about every four hours. I did the same for a while, but soon 
found it was not necessary. After I had found the proper temperature at 
which to keep the eggs during incubation, and also how often to turn them, 
I commenced the construction of an incubator. I used two dry goods 
boxes, one of which had served me as a wood box for several years. One 
box was a little larger than the other. I placed the smaller one inside the 
larger, and filled the space with sawdust. I thought it had to be thick so 
it would retain the heat. That was not a bad idea, either. I made a hot 
air space at the top and bottom. I thought the eggs should have heat 
from above and below. Then I put pipes through it and heated it with 
lamps just about the same as the modern hot air machines are heated to- 
day. It was a rude concern but it hatched chicks just the same. After 
the thermometer registered 102 degrees, I placed the eggs in my new 
machine and kept the temperature at the same point each day for three weeks, 
just the same as the hen did, with the result that I hatched 108 chicks 
from 116 eggs. I did not test any out. I did not know enough about such 
affairs at that time. I had six ventilators in the top and six in the bottom. 
After awhile I saw where I could make an improvement in my machine. I 
went to work and made a new one, and then another, and so on until I had 
made nine. Each machine was an improvement over the other. I made 
my own brooder also. Here is where goods boxes played an important part 
again. I put sheet iron in for a floor and placed a lamp under it to keep the 
chicks warm. Now with my home-made incubators and brooders I have 
raised as many as twenty-six hundred chicks in one year, and seldom less 
than fifteen hundred. 



4 INTItODIHTOUY 

Well, my success got into the papers. Sometimes good things were 
printed us well as bad things. Then I began to receive letters of inquiry in 
regard to operating an incubator, how and what to feed brooder chicks, and 
everything pertaining to poultry culture The first few years I did not re- 
ceive so many letters, but as the use of incubators became more prevalent, 
there were more inquiries. I tried to answer everyone, for how glad I would 
have been twonty-two years ago to have received a letter from some one 
who had had twenty- two years of practical experience, and how it would 
havo helped me through many trying difficulties and saved me many dis- 
appointments. At last I recoived so many letters that it was impossible to 
answer them all and do my work as it should be done. One day a friend 
said to mo, "Why not write a book on incubation and raising brooder 
chicks, telling everything in detail, just as you know it from experience; 
it would be so helpful-to new beginners?" This was the first time I had 
ever thought of the matter in that light. I wrote to several in answer to 
inquiries, that 1 would write a book if I thought I could sell enough copies 
to justify me. Mr. Payne, editor of the Nevada Representative, published 
one of those letters. Then I began to receive orders four months before I 
had commenced to write, so I thought I would put my experience to good 
account. Hence this book. Hoping that this little volume will prove of 
pleasure and profit to the reader, I remain 

Most sincerely yours, 

The Author. 



How to Hatch, Brood, Feed and Pre= 
vent Chicks From Dying in the Shell 



BJ 



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6 HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

good results from mongrel hens and good blooded cockerels. But if you 
are going into the business for profit get a good incubator and a good 
brooder, then buy or exchange eggs with some one that has good blooded 
fowls, and start right. It will cost a little more at first, but will pay you 
big dividends in the end. If you have eggs shipped to you, or if you carry 
them in a buggy any distance, they should rest at least ten hours before 
placing them in the incubator. If you have good blooded fowls you can 
sell your eggs and cockerels at a good price, too, just as well as your neigh- 
bor. Not only this, but you will get better returns for your labor, for it 
costs just as much to raise poor fowls as it does good ones; yes more, for 
pure breeds are stronger and more likely to live. 



Testing the Eggs to Set 

I ALWAYS test the eggs before I place them in the machine, especially 
if I buy them. One then has a chance to fill their machine full of good 
eggs. Some eggs have very thin, spotted shells. The shell will look 
very thin in some places and thick in others. These you should not set. 
Others that look as though they had been set on awhile should be dis- 
carded also. Do not set eggs that have bulged places on them; they 
almost invariably make cripples, nor any eggs that are too long or too 
round. Avoid extremes. Set only medium sized, nice, smooth, uniform 
eggs, not too large or too small. The room where you are testing the eggs 
should be dark. Night is the proper time to test, but if you want to 
test in the day time, darken the windows with something heavy so as not 
to admit any light whatever in the room. 



Testing Eggs for Fertility 

I TEST my eggs for fertility on the evening of the seventh day. Do not 
test in a very cold room. If you think they will get too cold before 
you finish testing, carry them to a warmer room to do the work. 
Take out one tray at a time and close the machine, turn the lamp up a lit- 
tle so the egg chamber will be quite warm, when you return the eggs, and 
it will not take them so long to get back to their proper temperature. 

Do not cool or turn the eggs the evening you test them. You can turn 
each egg as you place them back in the tray after you have tested them, 
and they will get cool enough in the operation of testing. As soon as you 
finish testing the first tray return it to the machine at once, then test the 
other one. Very dark brown eggs are harder to test than light colored 
ones, consequently I test them again on the sixteenth day. Then you can 



CHICKS FEOM DYING IN THE SHELL 7 

remove all that is not fertile. You can keep a more even temperature if all 
the infertile eggs and those that have dead chicks in are removed. Eggs 
that have a live chick in them are as black as night on the sixteenth day. 
Those that have dark and light spots in them are eggs that have started, 
then died, the death being caused by too high a temperature some time 
during the hatch, or perhaps a weak germ that would not have lived had 
it come to maturity. These eggs should all be removed. It is more diffi- 
cult to keep the proper temperature in the egg chamber if there are many 
bad eggs in your machine. Do not hold the eggs too close to the lamp while 
testing, as you will injure them. You will find eggs which you are 
doubtful about. These you should mark and in a few days examine them 
again. If you smell a foul odor in your machine hunt till you find the bad 
eggs. The quicker they are removed the better, for a spoiled egg may 
injure the hatch. Some Incubator Companies will tell you to test your 
eggs three times. This is unnecessary. Twice is sufficient. When I have 
a great deal to do I sometimes get mine tested but once, but it is better to 
test twice. You will get better results if all eggs with dead chicks in are 
removed. 

Never add eggs at different times. Put them all in at once. If you 
haven't enough to fill your machine wait a few days, for it will take more 
oil to hatch a few than an incubator full. The more eggs you have in the 
machine, the more animal heat you will have, consequently it will take 
less oil. The more fertile eggs you have in your incubator, the easier to 
keep the desired temperature. 



How to Start Your Incubators 

SET up your incubator according to the directions you receive with it. 
Place incubator in a bedroom or dry cellar; it should not be in a 
room where there is a fire unless the fire is kept up all the time. It 
should be in a room or cellar where the thermometer will not register lower 
than fifty degrees, and where the temperature can be kept as even as pos- 
sible. Never try to operate an incubator in an out- building in freezing 
weather. It would be all right in summer time if there was no draught 
and it could be well ventilated and kept dry, but the better the room is 
adapted to this purpose the less attention the incubator demands and the 
better the results will be. 

If your machine is a hot water one it must sit perfectly level in order 
to get the proper circulation through the heating pipes. It should not be 
set by guess, but you should use a spirit level. Now put on your regulator 
according to directions. Fill your boiler or pipes with boiling water. It 
would take too long to heat up the egg chambers if cold water was used. 



.8 HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

Light the lamp and run the machine until you have perfect control of the 
regulator, so that the thermometer will stand at 102 degrees for several 
hours before placing the eggs in the incubator. If your machine is a hot 
air machine it doesn't matter so much about its being level, but other con- 
ditions must be the same as a hot water machine. You should use the 
best oil you can procure. If you get cheap oil your wicks gum and the 
burners will clog up and ofttimes an explosion will result. I have lost my 
entire hatch several times by using poor oil. The lamps would blaze up 
and my eggs get too hot before I knew it and the chicks would all be 
dead in the shell. 



Proper Temperature for Successful Incubation 

YOUR thermometer should register 102 degrees for several hours before 
you place your eggs in the incubator. See that your regulator 
works perfectly according to the directions that came with your ma- 
chine. I cannot tell you just how it should be, for there are so many differ- 
ent kinds, but each machine has instructions which you should go by to 
the letter in setting up your machine. After placing the eggs in the incu- 
bator turn your lamp up a little so that it will not take so long to get your 
eggs to the proper temperature for incubation. When your thermometer 
registers 102, if it has a tendency to run higher, turn down the blaze of your 
lamp until it will stay at 102. Keep a steady heat of 102 the first week. If 
it runs to 103 the last of the first week, no harm results; the second week 
keep the temperature at 103; the third week keep the temperature at 103 
and 104. Do not let it run higher than 104 if you can help it. At pipping 
time keep the temperature at 103 and 104. This is the critical time. Too 
high a temperature and not enough ventilation is the cause of chicks dying 
in the shell. Your eegs are at least two degrees hotter at pipping than 
your thermometer registers because of so much animal heat in the eggs 
and the exertions the chicks make to free themselves of the shell. This is 
the reason I advise a temperature of 103 degrees, and not to exceed 104. 
You will hatch a greater per cent with the temperature at 103 than a 
higher temperature. As the hatch progresses remove the shells and turn 
all the eggs with the pipped side up. They will ofttimes smother when the 
pipped side is against the wire. 

Do not be afraid to open your machine so long as you keep your tem- 
perature up to 103 and 104. Do not disturb it until the chicks begin to 
come out of the shell. If you do not remove the shells, they will some- 
times slip over an egg that is pipped and smother the chick. If your ma- 
chine has not more than one or two ventilators, go to your machine every 
half hour and fan the door back and forth two or three times and fill the 



CHICKS FROM DYING IN THE SHELL 9 

egg chambers with fresh air, or in other words, oxygen. The eerg chambers 
must have fresh air while your eggs are hatching or your chick will die in 
the shell. I know that most of the instruction books say not to open your 
incubator till the hatch is done. This is a grand mistake and you will find 
it so if you will only investigate. There was not room enough in the nur- 
sery of my incubator to hold all the chicks I would hatch at one time. My 
incubator has nine ventilators, and then the chicks would open their 
mouths and pant; I would have to remove them as fast as they became 
strong enough. Too high a temperature at the beginning of the hatch 
injures the embryo; that is why some eggs start, then die after a few days 
of incubation. If the proper temperature has been maintained and some 
die after a few days, those are eggs with weak germs and are doomed, 
whether they die the first week or after incubation. 



Turning and Cooling the Egg 

WHEN placing the eggs in the incubator care should be taken to turn 
each egg over, as you do not turn them again for twenty-four hours. 
At the end of twenty-four hours turn them and change the outside 
eggs to the center and the center eggs to the outside. You will have a 
more even hatch by changing them in this way about every four days dur- 
ing the hatch. Do not cool the eggs the first time you turn them, only as 
long as it takes to turn and change them from the outside to center. But 
after this, cool them once and turn them twice a day, each day until the 
eggs begin to pip; then do not cool or turn them any more. Always cool 
your eggs in the morning; never in the evening, only as long as it takes 
to turn them. When you cool them in the morning do not turn them till 
they are cold, and just before you replace the trays in the egg chamber. 
This is nature's way. If you will observe a hen you will find that she sel- 
dom cools her eggs more than once a day, and that early in the morning, 
and if you will examine the eggs you will find they are perfectly cold. I 
used to advise cooling eggs twice a day, but found by experimenting that I 
obtained better results by cooling but once, unless the temperature 
rims too high during the day. Then take the trays out of the incubator 
for a few minutes, so as to run the temperature down quickly. Avoid ex- 
treme heat if possible. There is no given length of time to cool the eggs; 
that depends on the temperature of the room in which the incubator is 
located, and will have to be governed entirely by the operator. Just leave 
them out of the incubator till they feel not cool but cold to your face. 
There need be no fears that this cooling will do harm; the chicks will be 
the stronger for it and a larger per cent will hatch. In May, June and 
July, it takes longer for the eggs to cool than it does in March and April, 



10 HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

and as the hatch advances you will observe there is more animal heat in 
the eggs, consequently it will take longer to cool them than it did in the 
first of the hatch. If you want strong, healthy chicks, get them used to 
the cold while in the shell. They can stand more cold without injury while 
in the shell than they can after they are hatched, and it is better for them 
to get used to the changes of temperature while in the embryo state than 
to wait until after they are hatched. If you keep a high temperature dur- 
ing incubation, with little or no cooling, then place your chicks in a brooder 
with the temperature twenty degrees below that of your incubators; the 
change is too great, and your chicks will contract disease at once, and you 
will lose half or two-thirds of them. This sudden change is often the cause 
of bowel trouble and pneumonia in brooder chicks. I have left the trays 
out of my incubator all night several times after the eggs had been under 
the process of incubation two weeks. The first time I did this it was a mis- 
take. I had forgotten them, and I thought of course my eggs were ruined, 
but they hatched just as good as those in the rest of my incubators, and 
the chicks seemed stronger, but the hatch was retarded one-half day. I 
have left them out purposely since that time, just to experiment, and 
learned that eggs will stand all sorts of cold, just so it is not freezing 
weather. If you will take lessons from your hens you will learn just how 
cool your eggs should be and it will be a wonderful help to you. 

If you will always turn the eggs one way you will have less cripples. 
What I mean is, do not turn them backward one time and forward the 
next. Remove the first egg from each row, which will allow the eggs to 
move forward. Now with your hand move them forward gently. You will 
note that the eggs are turned about half over. Next place the eggs you 
have removed in the vacant space in the rear of the tray. This also 
changes their location in the incubator at each time of turning. For 
instance, after you have turned the eggs to the number of times you have 
eggs in each row you will then have the eggs that were' first placed in the 
rear end of the tray back again to the front end of the tray. If you will 
always turn them toward the little opening where the chicks drop into the 
nursery you cannot make a mistake. I would advise the operator to shift 
the trays from end to end and from side to side in their machine every 
time they turn the eggs, providing their machine has two trays. If they 
are operating a small incubator with but one tray, then all that is necessary 
is to turn the tray end for end. You will find this is quite a help in operat- 
ing and will overcome difficulties that are bound to exist where you set so 
many eggs together. You will avoid a lingering hatch by following the 
rules given above. 



CHICKS FROM DYING IN THE SHELL 11 

Ventilation and How to Prevent Chicks From 
Dying in the Shell 

THERE are many kinds and makes of incubators. Some are made 
of good material but do not give satisfaction because they are not 
ventilated properly. Others are made of poor material and soon 
warp, or the tank will rust out. Some do not give a uniform heat through- 
out the egg chambers, which makes a lingering hatch. Now I will tell 
you how an incubator should be ventilated for best results. There should 
be four ventilators in the bottom one at each end, about six inches from 
the end and on a line with the center of the incubator, and one at each 
side, (I mean the front and back,) about six inches from the front and back 
and on a line with the center the other way of the incubator. These ven- 
tilators should be about one-half inch holes and a strip of tin bent and 
tacked over them so that the cold air will not come in contact with the 
eggs. Then there should be two holes the same size as the others in each 
end just below the tank and about six inches from the front and back of 
the machine. There should be no ventilators in the front or back of your 
machine, only in the ends, bottom and top. The ventilators in the ends 
should be above the eggs so there will not be a direct draught over them. 
There should be a two-inch hole in the top of the machine, about 
the center. This ventilator I use when my chicks are hatching. I open 
all nine ventilators after the eggs begin to pip. This gives the chicks 
plenty of fresh air, and fresh air contains oxygen, which is the life of every 
living creature. Not a living thing that breathes on the face of the earth 
could live without oxygen. Then do you wonder that your chicks die in 
the shell, shut up in a tight box with a temperature of 103 or 104, with 
little or no fresh air. And your directions will tell you not to open the door 
until your hatch-is done! Dear reader, just reason a little and you will see 
that this is all a grand mistake. Your chicks must have fresh air and if 
your machine hasn't the proper ventilation just go to it every little while 
and fan the door back and forth three or four times. This is necessary 
only at hatching time. Chicks must have air, so do not fail to give it to 
them. I never allow my chicks to pant in the incubator. I have taken the 
tray out and set it upon the machine for a minute to give my chicks fresh 
air, for if they get over-heated in the incubator it is just as fatal to them 
as if they were overheated in the brooder. Too high a temperature and 
not enough ventilation at hatching time will cause chicks to have bowel 
trouble. 

The ventilators on the end of the machine should have a round piece 
of tin tacked over them so they can be moved to give fresh air when it is 
necessary. I open these end ventilators one-third on the third day of in- 



12 HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

cubation. At the end of the first week I open them a little more, and 
every day or two I open a little more until at the end of the second week 
they are wide open— except the one on top— and continue so until the end 
of the hatch. The two inch ventilator on top I begin to open at pipping 
time, just a little at first and more as I see it is necessary. Incubators 
that haven't enough ventilation can be reconstructed by putting in extra 
ventilators and made to do good work. The four ventilators in the bottom 
of the incubator should be left open all the time with a piece of cupped 
tin over them. This piece of tin should be about four inches long and 
three inches wide and cupped just a little so the air can enter the egg 
chamber. This tin gives the air a chance to get warm before it reaches 
the eggs. I have hatched chicks by the thousand according to the direc- 
tions I have marked out to you, and so can you if you will do just as I have 
told you. 



Moisture and When to Introduce It 

A PEW days before your incubator is due to hatch, take a piece of 
loosely woven burlap or coffee sack, wash it perfectly clean and 
scald. After it dries press it and cut it just the size of the bottom 
of your incubator. Hem it all around so the little chicks will not tangle in 
the ravelings. Now if you have any ventilators in the bottom of your 
machine (which you should have), make a hole in the burlap just over the 
ventilators and buttonhole around it, so that the air can pass through 
into the egg chamber, just the same as if the burlap was not there. 
As soon as you see four or five eggs pipped remove the trays from the incu- 
bator and place them on a blanket, then take some lukewarm water and 
sprinkle your eggs and replace the trays at once Your thermometer should 
register 101 degrees before you give your eggs this bath or sprinkling, for 
this sprinkling will have a tendency to lower the temperature a little. Do 
not let your thermometer register more than 101, or below 102. At pipping 
time, after the chicks begin to come out of the shell, dampen burlap men- 
tioned above with boiling water. Do not make it wet enough to drip. Now 
remove the trays again. Place the steaming burlap in the bottom of your 
incubator. Now replace your trays while the burlap is steaming, close 
your doors, and do not open again for awhile so the eggs will get the full 
benefit of the steam. Leave this burlap in the bottom of your machine till 
the hatch is done. This is all the moisture you need to introduce into your 
machine during the whole hatch unless for some cause the temperature in 
your incubator should run up to 108 or 110 or higher. You can sometimes 
save your hatch, or a part of it, if they have not been hot too long, by re- 
moving the trays from your machine and shower the eggs with warm 



CHICKS FROM DYING IN THE SHELL 13 

water. Leave them out of your incubator until the eggs are cool. Once I 
saved 167 chicks from 208 eggs, after my thermometer registered 113 de- 
grees, by showering them in this way. I turned the flame of my lamp up 
and forgot it, as we all do sometimes, you know. Do not let this occur 
very often for they will take up a great deal of moisture when they are 
quite warm. This sprinkling is to lower the temperature quickly. If they 
were left to cool of themselves after the thermometer registers 113, 
not many would survive without this bath. I used to moisten my eggs 
every day. The consequence was I drowned my chicks or a great many 
of them. I have learned by experience that the eggs need drying out 
instead of moisture, so the chick will have room to pip. 

You will observe during the last few days of incubation that your trays 
are much lighter than they were the first week; of incubation. Sometimes 
chicks have a tendency to stick to the shell. This is why you should put 
this steaming burlap in the bottom of your incubator. It penetrates the 
egg at once, loosens the chick so it can turn and pip the shell clear around 
and come out. The pans which the Incubator Companies furnish with 
their incubators are a perfect nuisance. They moisten a few eggs, that's 
true, but only those that are just above the pan. For best results and an 
even hatch you want your eggs all moistened at the same time. If you 
would have success do not fail to do as I have told you in every detail. 
This damp burlap may have a tendency to lower the temperature a little. 
If so turn up your lamp until your thermometer registers 103 or 104. Be 
sure that you do not cover up the ventilators in the bottom of you incuba- 
tor with the burlap, but place the openings in the burlap directly over the 
ventilators in your incubator so the air can come through the ventilators in 
the egg chamber and you will not smother your chicks. 



How to Pip the Egg 

AFTER the chicks are all hatched that you think are going to hatch 
you can save a great many by pipping the shell yourself, by doing 
as I will tell you. I have saved as many as twenty in one hatch. 
First, break the egg at A. Strike it gently on the head of a nail or some- 
thing very solid. Remove enough of the shell so you can see the position 
of the chick in the shell. If the chick is alive you may find the membrane 
broken at B and the chick's bill protruding. If so place it in the incuba- 
tor again till the blood has all been taken up by the chick and it begins to 
make exertions to get out, then remove the shell, providing it does not bleed. 
If you do not find the bill at B, then pip the shell at C. If the membrane 
or lining of the egg resembles greased paper open it with a pin to give the 
chick air till it is all finished up. You can remove a great deal of the shell 



14 HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

if you will keep the membrane damp, and no harm will result. I have 
often removed nearly the entire shell before I could locate the bill. The 
chick must have air. Open the shell some where whether you find the bill 
or not. Sometimes the bill will strike the wing and cannot reach the 
shell, but the chick would be strong and healthy if you can only save it. 
Some one will tell you that a chick that cannot hatch without help is no 




1*J 

Diagram showing how to pip the egg 

good. This is all a mistake. I advise you to save all you can, if you do 
have to pick them out of the shell, for you will lose enough after they are 
hatched if you happen to overfeed or overheat them. If you will remove 
the shell from those that die it will give you an idea of the exact position 
of the chick and make it easier for vou to locate the bill. It will be a 
great help to you. 



How to Prepare the Brooder for the Chicks 

FIRST, place paper in the bottom of the brooder, then cover the entire 
brooder floor with dry sand, (dry sand, mind you), to the depth of 
one-half inch, if the weather is quite cold. But if it be warm, one- 
fourth inch will do. The feed room of brooder should have straw or tim- 
othy chaff scattered over the floor, so it will furnish the chicks exercise 
while waiting for their food. Place your lamp in your brooder about five 
or six hours before you want to put the chicks in it. Be sure the sand is 
warm and keep the temperature at about eighty degrees. If you have a 
good hatch the temperature will rise to about ninety degrees after the 
chicks are put in the brooder. This temperature, ninety degrees, should 
be kept for the first week or ten days, then gradually wean them away 
from the heat as their strength will permit. The operator can lower the 



CHICKS FEOM DYING I1ST THE SHELL 15 

heat gradually and still keep the flock comfortable. If the chicks crowd 
to the warmest part of the brooder and pile up, it is an indication of too 
low a temperature. If they move about with drooping wings and 
open mouths and sit outside of the hover, then the temperature is too 
high. There is no regularity known that will give as good satisfaction as 
the chicks themselves, as their actions will easily demonstrate whether 
they are too cold or too hot. The ventilators should be left part way open 
to admit fresh air, but no set rule could be given here just how wide they 
should'be left open, as there are many different makes of brooders and 
much depends on the weather as well as the location of the brooder. The 
brooder should be kept absolutely clean, removing the sand and chaff every 
other day. Chicks in a good brooder, if furnished with pure, warm air at 
all times, and if the brooder be kept clean, will thrive and grow very rap- 
idly, while on the other hand, if the brooder becomes filthy you may expect 
to lose nearly the entire hatch. The gas that rises from a filthy brooder is 
very poisonous to little chicks and causes dysentery. This becomes con- 
tagious and will go through your whole flock if you do not remove the 
afflicted chicks and clean and disinfect your brooders and brooder houses. 
This can be done with lime and sulphur. Whitewash your brooders and 
brooder houses with fresh lime. Air-slacked lime will not do; it is not 
strong enough. Then fumigate with sulphur. Remove your chicks to a 
place where they will be comfortable while this work is going on. The 
brooder must be dry before placing the chicks in it again. The white- 
wash will answer a double purpose; it will destroy mites and lice as well as 
cleanse your house and brooder. If you will always place a newspaper in 
the brooder before putting in the sand and chaff it will be a great deal 
easier cleaned. When your chicks are two weeks old you can use hay or 
straw instead of sand on your brooder floors. Change it twice a week until 
they are three weeks old, then once a week will do. Watch for mites; they 
can get in their deadly work in a very short time. They breed and accumu- 
late very fast and will sap the lives of your little chicks before you hardly 
know it. Keep your lamp burners clean, also your wicks. Dirty wicks are 
often the cause of brooder lamps exploding. You can clean your lamp 
burners by boiling them in strong soap suds. Put your sand in pans and 
place in the oven and heat it. It will not take so long to heat the brooder 
if sand is thus warmed, before placing it in the brooder. 



When to Remove Chicks to the Brooder 

IP you have a good hatch, your incubator will become crowded before the 
hatch is done. Remove all the strong chicks that seem dissatisfied and 
crowd to the front of the incubator to the brooder that you have 
heated and prepared for them according to directions. Take from 



16 HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

the machine only those that are lively and can toddle around. Now 
watch the temperature of your brooder. Do not let it get too warm, for 
just as soon as you put chicks in the brooder the temperature will begin 
to rise. Keep turning the lamp down and keep the temperature at about 
90 degrees. I place my brooder in the kitchen or dining room for the first 
thirty-six hours, or until the hatch is all done and the time comes to feed 
them. It makes less work for the operator and you can watch the temper- 
ature of your brooder better. You may think it will not look well to put 
your chicks in the kitchen or dining room. Do not think any such thing. 
I would rather think it was an ornament even to the parlor, considering 
the prices of poultry and eggs for the last few years. If you can save your 
hatch by using the best room in your house for your brooder for a few 
days, do it, for it would be just like piling up silver dollars. If you have 
an early hatch, say in March or April, and you think it too cold to remove 
your brooder and chicks to the brooder house, first spread a newspaper in 
front of your brooder, and scatter a little sand and chaff over it. Nail some 
short boards together and make a little run. Then let your little chicks 
out for exercise and feed. If you have the room to spare keep this little 
run in front of your brooder for a few days and let the chicks run in and 
out at will. They will soon learn that the brooder is warm and will depend 
upon it warming them just the same as they would a hen. Remove the 
paper as often as it gets soiled, say twice a day. Scatter your feed, also a 
little timothy seed on this paper. This will give them exercise, for they 
will work and scratch and chatter and seem better contented than if they 
had nothing to do. After a few days, when the chicks have learned that 
the brooder is their home and mother, remove them to the brooder house. 
They will be stronger and can stand the cold better than they could if you 
had removed them there just after taking them out of the incubator. 
Sometimes in the spring, the temperature falls quite low in the night. You 
will have to watch this closely, as your chicks will pile up and smother. 
They will never pile up if they are warm enough. I always kill the crip- 
ples. They never amount to anything if they live, and all the time you 
put in on them is just wasted. Sometimes, on a rainy day, after the 
chicks are quite large, they will pile up in the brooder and smother or 
trample the weak ones to death. You can avoid this by making a fire in 
the brooder house. There are old second-hand stoves one can buy very 
reasonable that will answer the purpose. I have a stove in each one of my 
brooder houses and in the early spring I keep a fire all day so the chicks 
will not become chilled and take cold. They seem better contented, too. 
I cover the floor of the brooder house with dry dirt in the early spring; it 
keeps out the wind and makes it much warmer. I sprinkle ashes and a 
little lime over this floor and when the house is warm and the sun shines 
in on the floor the chicks will just make the dust fly. When this becomes 



CHICKS FROM DYING IN THE SHELL 17 

filthy clean it out and put in some more. You will not have to clean it 
often. It is less work than scrubbing the floor. 



How and What to Feed Brooder Chicks 

FOR years past every reader of the poultry and agricultural papers have 
read the statement, reiterated time and time again, that it is a com- 
paratively easy matter to hatch chicks in incubators, but a difficult 
matter to raise them. So it has been, and so it is today. Feeding brooder 
chicks is the most important part of poultry culture. I have found this 
out by experience. I used to feed my chicks to death. I killed them try- 
ing to be good to them, consequently I have given the subject of feeding 
brooder chicks a great deal of careful study and have found at last how 
and what to feed them for best results. Do not feed the young chicks for 
from twenty-four to thirty-six hours after, they are hatched, but allow 
them to pick at sand, charcoal, a little bran, and timothy seed, that has 
been placed in the brooder. At the end of twenty-four or thirty-six hours, 
to 200 chicks feed one- third cup of broken rice If you cannot obtain 
broken rice, just grind some whole rice in your coffee mill. Do not grind it 
very fine as a great deal will go to dust which will be a loss. Feed this raw 
and dry. Then iu about three hours give them a drink of boiled, sweet, 
skimmed milk. Do not let them drink all they want of it for ten days, but 
just enough to moisten their food real good. In the evening give them 
one-half teacup of lettuce chopped real fine. This amount is for 200 
chicks. Feed rice, lettuce and boiled milk but once the first day. The 
second day feed one-half teacup of rice three times, once in the morning, 
at noon and night, and one-half cup of lettuce at ten o'clock in the forenoon 
and one-half cup, chopped fine, at three in the afternoon. Give boiled sweet 
milk but twice a day for ten days, once in the forenoon and once in the 
afternoon. Do not put this drink in open dishes, or troughs, and do not try 
to water all at the same time, but make some fountains out of old tin fruit 
cans. Punch a hole about the size of a ten penny nail one-fourth inch 
down from the open end of the can. Put the milk or water in this. Place 
aHaucer over the top and turn quickly and the milk or water will come 
out as fast as the chicks drink it. A quart can is the right size for a 
saucer and a pint can the size for a sauce dish. This prevents the chicks 
from getting wet. Water just a few chicks at a time so you will be sure 
they do not get too much, for they can founder on water or milk just as 
quickly as they can on feed, and it affects them just the same. Take a 
cracker box and put two of the can fountains in it, then put ten or fifteen 
chicks in it and watch them and see that they all get a drink, but not too 
much. After they have had enough, remove them to another box. Do 



18 HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

not put them back in the brooder as you will not know which chicks you 
have watered. Now put ten or fifteen more in the box that contains the 
fountains and do just as you did before, and so on until they have all had 
a drink. Do this for several days until they all learn how to drink, then fix 
more cans, about six or eight to 200 chicks, so they can all drink at once, 
but do not let them have all they will drink. After ten days fill the cans 
with water and leave them sit till the chicks have had all they want, then 
you can keep water or milk by them all the time. Early in spring before 
you can have lettuce, cut clover or blue grass is a good substitute. They 
must have something green. Cabbage must not be fed to brooder chicks 
till they are four weeks old: it loosens their bowels too much. After the 
chicks are eight days old begin to feed a few bread crumbs and a little 
cracked wheat mixed with their rice. Feed this till they are three weeks 
old, then you can mix a little course ground meal with their feed. When 
they are four weeks old feed anything you please and as much as you 
please. You should feed ground bone or beef scraps three times a week 
after the first week, not too much at a time; it takes the place of bugs, 
worms, and grasshoppers which they would get if running with a hen. 
Every poultry raiser should have a bone cutter; it does not cost much and 
one can utilize every old bone and convert it into profit, which otherwise 
would be a waste. For best results in raising brooder chicks you must 
make the conditions as near like they were with a hen as possible. Scatter 
timothy seed and bran in the chaff in the brooder, also over the floor of 
the brooder house; it will keep the chicks busy and it would take a long 
time for them to eat enough to hurt them. The heavy breeds require 
a little more feed than the Leghorns or Minorcas, but do not feed too much. 
If you will heat the rice a little, the chicks do better and it will kill disease 
germs. 

If you can keep your chicks healthy for two weeks, all danger is pas 
so far as feed is concerned, but watch your brooder and brooder house 
closely for mites; if they get a start in your brooder they will soon sap the 
life of your little chicks. 

Do not feed any sour food or moulded bread to your chicks. Do not 
wet their food. Wet, sloppy food will cause dysentery, which is very fatal 
to brooder chicks because it is very contagious; it is liable to go through 
your whole flock if it once gets started. You should remove all chicks 
that are affected in this way and clean your brooder thoroughly, then close 
it up and burn sulphur in it. This will kill all disease germs. 

After your chicks are twelve days old you can increase their feed. To 
200 chicks give one-half cup of rice three times a day and one cup of 
lettuce twice a day. You can feed part rice and part wheat, or bread 
crumbs. Do not feed more than they will clean up; if they leave any, miss 
one feed. Count your chicks and measure your feed accordingly. I made 



CHICKS FKOM DYING IN THE SHELL 19 

arrangements with a Chicago firm from which to buy rice. I can buy it 
so that I can sell it for $3.00 per hundred weight. This is cheaper than 
wheat for it does not require more than half as much rice as it does most 
any other kind of food. It is the best food for little chicks that can be 
procured; it is nutritious but nothing rich or greasy about it. There is not 
so much danger of bowel trouble when you feed rice. It is the best food I 
have ever tried and I have tried everything. Break up charcoal and scat- 
ter over the floor of your brooder house, or better still, pound it up real 
fine and mix it with chopped lettuce; it keeps their crops sweet and aids 
digestion. You must sow lots of lettuce; it will save so much feed. 



Early Hatched Chickens Are Best 

BEST results are obtained from early hatches -March, April and May. 
There are then not so many disease germs as appear later* in the 
season, and you do not have lice and mites to contend with until 
June, July, August and September. You can hatch and raise chicks in 
June, July, and August, but you can raise a greater per cent with less 
trouble earlier in the season. I would advise every one to hatch their 
chicks as early as possible. The early chicks seem stronger and grow 
larger than those hatched later in the season. Another advantage in hav- 
ing early hatches, the pullets will commence laying early in the fall and if 
they have comfortable quarters and proper food, will continue to lay all 
winter. 

I used to hatch chicks all summer, for I had but two incubators and 
could not hatch as many as I do now. After I hatched all I wanted for 
myself, I would hatch for my neighbors. In this way I could keep up ex- 
penses for eggs, oil, incubators, brooders, feed yard, etc. At one hatch this 
season I took 1,087 chicks from my incubators in one day. I advertised in 
the papers two weeks before my incubators were due to hatch that I would 
hatch 1,000 chicks on the 19th day of July. 

Many people have expressed the desire to come to my home when my 
incubators hatched, so they could see just what I did to obtain such good 
results. That is why I advertised that I would hatch 1,000 chicks on that 
day. I invited all to come, and about 100 responded. I exceeded my 
promise by eighty- seven and only lost twenty-three chicks in the shell. 
The weather was quite warm and my incubators, six of them, were all in 
one room. The animal heat in the egg kept up the desired temperature, so 
that I did not have any lamps under my incubators for four days before 
the hatch, and removed 975 chicks before I used any artificial heat at all. 
Then I collected the eggs that were pipped and those that were not and 
put them in one incubator, lighted a lamp and placed under it to finish 



20 HOW TO HATCH, BEOOD, FEED AND PEEVENT 

the hatch. Those 1,0S7 chicks were hatched with the temperature at 103 
degrees. Then the chicks seemed awfully warm. There is where I have 
made a mistake so many times, keeping too high a temperature at pipping 
time. I sold those chicks. They brought me about sixty dollars; my eggs 
cost me twelve. Not so bad for three weeks work, was it.? 



How to Hatch Ducks by Incubation 

IT takes the same temperature and treatment for duck eggs as it does for 
hen eggs, with the exception of moisture. Duck eggs require moisture 
while hen eggs do not. You do not introduce moisture into your ma-, 
chine, however, till the second week of incubation. Then, about every four 
days place a damp cloth (one thickness only) in the nursery or bottom of 
your incubator, leave it there until it is dry, then remove it until the time 
comes to replace it again. At pipping time shower the eggs and use the 
burlap just the same as you do when hatching chicks. Do not use the 
burlap for moisture during the hatch, as it is heavy and will hold more 
moisture than is required. I use an open flour sack. I wring it as dry as 
I can out of hot water. Watch your eggs at pipping time and turn all the 
pipped eggs with pipped side up so they will not smother. Do not place 
hen eggs and duck eggs in the same machine, as the treatment is different, 
also the time. It takes three weeks for hen eggs to hatch and four weeks 
for duck eggs, consequently the changes of the eggs take place at different 
times. 

Brooding Ducks— Ducks do not need as much care as chicks; they 
can stand more cold and wet. However, I keep them warm for a few days, 
then let them run at will, but place them in a brooder at night, for rats, 
skunks and weasles are death on young ducks. 

You can make a comfortable brooder for ducks out of a goods box. Just 
remove one board, so as to give the top a slant, replace the top, saw the 
sides even with the top, then take a piece of oil cloth or an old grain sack, 
or even a piece of muslin will do. Cover with common barn paint. If you 
put it on quite thick, one coat will do. I have made good coops for hens 
and chicks in this way. 

The Pekin variety, above all others, seem to meet the market want 
best. They are the most popular, as well as the most profitable duck we 
have in this country. They are very large, creamy white, laying from 100 
to 150 eggs each season. They are, as a rule, very easy to raise, mature 
quickly, and are the leading variety for market; do not require water except 
for drinking. Pekin ducks are, as a rule, very healthy, not being subject 



CHICKS FEOM DYING IN THE SHELL 



21 




Mammoth Imperial Pekin Ducks 

The Best Ducks Raised 



to many of the diseases that poultry is heir to. The demand for Pekins 
was never as large as during the past year, thus proving their popularity, 
and that people realize there is money in duck culture. 



How and What to Feed Ducks 

IN the first place you should never keep ducks confined only for a day or 
two. Just as soon as they are strong enough to run after a hen turn 

them out. 

You do not have to be as particular about feeding them as you do 
chicks and turkeys; they will eat almost anything. But for best results it 
is better to feed them cooked feed for the first week or two. Corn bread 
without any grease in it is good; also light bread soaked in boiled milk. 
After two weeks they will eat corn meal, boiled potatoes, beef scraps or 
most any thing you have a mind to feed them. They should have ground 
bone about three times a week and lettuce as many times a day as you have 
time to give it to them. Feed them lettuce from the start; they are very 
fond of it and will grow a great deal faster and do a great deal better than 
without it. If you have a hatch early in the spring before lettuce comes 



22 HOW TO HATCH, BEOOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

on, feed them alfalfa meal. Steam it or pour a little boiling water over it 
to moisten and make it soft. It is a cheap feed for either chicks, ducks or 
geese, early in the spring, before there is any green stuff to feed them. Do 
not fail to plant lettuce every week and plenty of it. You can almost raise 
ducks on lettuce. It will lessen your expense for feed one-half. I have 
never raised enough yet to do me, but if I live I shall sow it every week 
this coming season. You can plant it in little nooks and corners of your 
gardens and fields that would otherwise lie idle. If you buy your seed by 
the pound you can get it a great deal cheaper. Ducks are more healthy 
when given plenty of lettuce. The Pekin is the most profitable breed you 
can raise; they grow fast and mature young. Keep plenty of fresh water 
by them at all times. 



Mating, Breeding and Rearing Turkeys 

THE Mammoth Bronze turkey is the acknowledged king of all turkeys. 
Plumage of the male on back and breast is a brilliant bronze hue, 
which glistens in the sunlight like buroished gold. Wing coverts 
are a beautiful rich bronze, the feathers terminating in a wide bronze band 
across the wings when folded, and separated from the primaries by a glossy, 
black, ribbon-like mark, formed by the ends of the coverts. 

Tail — Each feather is irregularly penciled with narrow bands of light 
brown, and ending in a broad black band, with a wide edging of dull white 
or gray. In the female the entire plumage is similar to that of the male, 
but the colors are not so brilliant or clearly defined, and the edging of the 
feathers is generally a dull white or gray. 

The Mammoth Bronze is the hardiest of all turkeys, and the most ex- 
tensively raised of any breed. They are good layers, many claiming them 
to lay over 100 eggs in one season. However, there are exceptions in all 
things, but it is no unusual occurrence for a turkey hen to lay fifty eggs 
during hatching season, say from April 1st to July 1st. Most turkeys do 
not lay after the 1st of July. 

To get the best results in mating and breeding turkeys the most im- 
portant factor is the relations of the breeding stock, which should be 
strong, vigorous birds of both sexes, as we get enough weak turkeys with- 
out breeding for them. So if strong, healthy turkeys are to be expected, 
we must breed from the most selected stock that can be found. I am a 
lover of the bronze turkey. They are the largest breed of turkeys found 
and the most profitable, I think, of any turkey one can raise, although I 
have been raising the white turkey for several years, as my neighbors were 
raising the bronze birds, and I have had good success. Select the breed 
that suits you best, then you will be more apt to give them better care and 



CHICKS FROM DYING IN THE SHELL 



23 



advantages than you would a breed you do not like. Select females with 
good bone and long, deep bodies, with head and wattles as red as possible, 
as these qualities show good health. Avoid all extremes either in over- 
grown or small, weak birds. Those who use great extremes usually round 
up in the fall with very small flocks, while those who use better judgment 
in selecting their breeding stock almost invariably raise good flocks. Do 
not allow your breeders to become over-fat. Keep them in good condition 
and give them plenty of exercise. Turkeys should be allowed free range at 
all times, but keep them gentle and never frighten them. Teach them to 
nest near the house, if you can, by building appropriate nests for them. 




This can be done by laying empty barrels in fence corners or under hedges 
and placing brush and limbs over them. Put some straw in the barrel and 
leave room for some brush over the front of the barrel. They like such a 
nest and think they are hiding in a brush pile. If you let your turkeys go 
to the timber and make their nest,, the crows are sure to rob their nests, or 
the eggs will chill, for we have some very cold nights after the turkeys begin 
to lay in the 'spring. If you can induce them to lay in the nests you have 
prepared for them, you can gather the eggs daily and place them where 
you can turn them each day until ready for incubation. Turkey hens 



24 HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

make splendid incubators and rarely ever forsake the nest until their 
brood is out. I always give my hens from sixteen to twenty eggs each. 
This, however, will depend upon the size of the hen. 

I always let my turkeys raise their own young as it is their nature to 
take them into the pastures and meadows where the insects, which fur- 
nish a great part of their food, are more plentiful. ' Turkeys raised 
around the poultry yard are more subject to disease than those that run 
at large. When I raise turkeys with hens I feed them boiled milk, and 
broken rice not cooked, lettuce chopped fine, a little bread soaked in boiled 
milk, charcoal and oyster shells, for the first week. Then I begin to feed 
a little ground bone; not much at first; it has a tendency to loosen the 
bowels. Feed them rice and light bread till they are three weeks old, then 
you can feed meal, or better still corn bread, but do not stop the rice and 
light bread entirely until they get used to the corn bread or meal. They 
should be fed three times a day. 

Turkeys should not be cooped up or compelled to roost on the same 
spot each night, unless the coop be cleaned every morning and exposed to 
sun and wind so it will be perfectly dry by night. When large enough to 
fly up into trees, or on roosts, begin to feed them cracked corn, wheat and 
soaked oats. When the nights grow cold in the fall insects begin to die, 
consequently you will have to feed the turkeys more grain if you want nice 
plump fowls to put on the market at Thanksgiving. A great many times 
in the fall of the year you have small potatoes that are not marketable, 
also cabbage and beets, more than you can dispose of. They are excellent 
to feed to your turkeys. Boil the potatoes and beets, but the cabbage can 
be fed raw. 

Sprinkle a little sulphur over your turkeys at night, if you have them 
in a coop. The lice will not bother so much if you do this. 



Culture of Geese 

Goose eggs do not hatch well i?i an incubator , 

THE Toulouse geese are the most profitable to raise; they are an En- 
glish breed. The bill and feet are a dark orange color. Both male 
and female are uniform in color; heads, neck and back a dark grey, 
breast light grey, beyond the leg to the tail they are pure white. They 
grow very large and live to a great old age. Goose raising is very profit 
able if one will manage it right, for they need no grain in summer, but 
they must have plenty of grass. If one would fence off an acre for geese 
you would be surprised how many you could raise on that one acre. I 
always set goose eggs under hens; they hatch better than with geese. I 
never pick my geese in the laying season, but I pick the ganders all the 



CHICKS FROM DYING IN THE SHELL 



25 



year round. I pick the geese in fall and early winter but not after Feb- 
ruary. In early spring when there is no grass I use alfalfa meal or cut 
clover to feed the goslings; they will not live without green stuff of some 
sort. Lettuce is fine for geese, but it takes lots of it. I used to plant a 
little lettuce in a box in the window in the early spring to feed to my early 
goslings; they liked it very much and did well on it. They will not bear 




Toulouse Geese 



confinement. An orchard is a nice place in which to raise geese. You 
should keep only what you want for breeding purposes through the winter 
for they eat a great deal of grain and are not profitable to keep for their 
feathers alone. They should be fed corn, oats, millet, wheat, speltz, or 
anything that will fatten them quickly in the fall, then put them on the 
market just as soon as you think the price will justify you to do so. As 
soon as grass is gone they are very expensive for they will eat all of the 
time if they can get food, so tbe sooner you dispose of your surplus the 
better. The Jews are very fond of goose meat and they use the oil for 
cooking the same as we do lard, consequently geese command a better 
price if they are quite fat. 



26 



HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 




Barred Plymouth Rocks 

This breed is as solid as its name; they stand acknowledged as the best 
general purpose fowl in the world today; they are quick to develop and 
make plump, juicy broilers at the age of eight and ten weeks. They are a 
great favorite with market poultrymen who breed this variety more ex- 
tensively than all other breeds combined. They are excellent all-the-year- 
round layers, and as a fancier's fowl have reached a popularity never before 
known. 



CHICKS FROM DYING IN THE SHELL 



27 




~^» 



Silver Laced Wyandottes 



This popular American breed is very beautiful as well as profitable, 
and for a table fowl are unexcelled. They ape among the best layers, care- 
ful setters and their flesh is fine grained. They are hardy and mature 
early; have bright yellow legs and skin, and low rose combs; and combine 
all the good qualities of a general purpose fowl. 



28 HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

Which is the Best General Purpose Fowl? 

I FIND the Barred Plymouth Rocks or the Silver Laced Wyandottes are 
the best for a general purpose chicken, where one wants to keep only a 
few. But if it is egg production you are after and do not care so much 
about the market quality of the stock, I would advise you to breed the 
Single Comb or the Rose Comb Brown Leghorn. There is no use to look 
any farther; they are good enough and the eggs are easily procured at 
reasonable figures, for so many people all over the country are raising 
them. They are hardy and do not require more than half the feed that 
the larger breeds do. I intend to lay in a supply of thoroughbred Plymouth 
Rocks and Leghorns this coming season and will try to supply my patrons 
with thoroughbred stock at more reasonable prices than they can procure 
them elsewhere. 



Feeding Hens for Egg Production in Winter 

TO do this you must commence in the previous spring. Plant beets, 
carrots, onions, turnips, cabbage, potatoes, squashes, pumpkins, 
wheat, corn, oats, speltz and millet. You may think this is more of 
a variety than is necessary, but it is not. You must study what is required 
for egg production in summer, and make the conditions in winter as near 
like those of the warmer months as possible. You will have to have char- 
coal, alfalfa and clover meal to take the place of grass; crushed oyster 
shells and air-slacked lime to make egg shells; broken dishes or crockery 
to make a sharp grit to grind their food. If you can get good sharp grit or 
gravel it will do just as well, but we often forget to lay in a supply till 
after the ground is frozen, then we cannot get it. But the hen must get 
something of the sort, or they will have indigestion, and your chickens will 
droop and die. Broken dishes make a good substitute for grit. It should 
be broken up into pieces about the size or a little smaller than grains of 
corn. 

This is how I feed my hens for egg production in winter, and have 
obtained good results: I feed corn in the morning, then about ten o'clock I 
feed them a mash consisting of boiled potatoes, chopped onions, alfalfa 
meal, charcoal, bran, shorts and oil meal. I give them this mash every 
morning. About twice or three times a week, I feed a little ground bone 
and blood meal in their mash. I give them baked squash, beets or pump- 
kin about three times a week. At about one o'clock each day I feed them 
oats that have been scalded; at about four o'clock I feed corn again. I give 
plenty of warm water, with a little sulphate of iron (copperas) in it; this 
keeps them healthy. Now you will think this a great deal of trouble, but 
if you will watch your hens after feeding them their mash and see how 



CHICKS FROM DYING IN THE SHELL 29 

thej' relish it and how happy they seem, it will pay you for all your trouble. 
Besides, you will have the satisfaction of getting a nice lot of eggs at the 
time of year when prices are the highest. I am now selling eggs at twenty- 
five cents per dozen; that would be 87.50 a case. Do you not think- that 
price will justify j r ou in giving your chickens a little more attention? 

You must have warm houses for your chickens. I think every hen 
house should be lathed and plastered, which keeps out the wind and snow, 
and your hens will soon pay for the expense of plastering. I parch corn 
for them two or three times a week. It tabes but a moment to put it in 
the oven and it will be parched by the time you have your work done, so 
there is no time lost. I never feed frozen corn, but I take it into the house 
until the frost is out of it, or, still better, warm it. Always salt the mash 
a little. Chickens as well as animals require salt. 

If your hens lay in winter you can set your incubator so much earlier 
in the spring. I have all my brooder houses plastered. One can rid their 
houses of lice and mites much easier when the houses are plastered than 
when they are only boarded up. 



Mrs. Johnson's Method of Forcing a Molt 

TO THE FANCIER: When a specialty is made of producing winter 
eggs, or preparing fowls for exhibitions, it is of much import- 
ance to have your fowls shed their feathers early so that the new 
plumage may be grown before the fairs, and poultry shows, and cold 
weather begins. In case molting is much delayed the production of the 
new coat of feathers in cold weather is such a drain on the vitality of the 
fowls that few if any eggs are produced until spring, while if the molt takes 
place early in the season your fowls begin winter in good condition, and 
with proper housing and feeding may be made to lay during the entire 
winter. 

I have tried the Van Dresser method of promoting early molting, with 
results that were not very satisfactory. I was anxious to get the full bene- 
fit of a quick molt, so I fed my fowls very sparingly of oats, corn and speltz 
for about two weeks. I did not give them any green cut bone, or milk, 
which is the best egg producing food that can be fed to poultry. The con- 
sequence was, during the first week of the starving process, the hens 
stopped laying entirely, though they had been laying over 300 eggs a day. 
After two weeks, I put them on full feed again. I suppose I gave 
them too much on the start, for some became crop-bound, some had bowel 
trouble, others indigestion, and the consequence was, I lost several of my 
nicest hens. They molted all right, but it was three months before they 
commenced to lay again. Some did not lay any until the next spring. 



30 HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

Well, as the method of stuffing and starving was not satisfactory, I began 
to investigate. I read every article 1 could on how to force a quick molt, 
but all the papers and poultry journals advocated the starving and heavy 
feeding process. I finally thought of a method that I believed would work 
and resolved to try it at once. I took about fifteen hens and picked them. 
The result was charming. You fanciers will hail me with a cheer when 
you read this article. I plucked the body feathers first, then just as soon 
as the feathers began to come in, which was in about ten days, I plucked 
their wings and tail. By the time the wings began to grow, the feathers 
on each side of the birds were large enough to support the wings. Within 
six weeks they had an entire new coat of feathers, and the most of them 
were laying eggs. Then I was provoked that I did not pluck the whole 
flock. This beats any method of forcing a molt that I ever heard of. It is 
more effectual, that is one thing certain. Your fowls have not been weak- 
ened by starving, but are in good shape to make a new coat of feathers at 
once. You must feed plenty of milk and green cut bone once a day for two 
weeks if you can possibly get it. If green bone cannot be obtained, meat 
scraps or cracklings will do, mixed with a mash consisting of bran shorts, 
alfalfa meal, charcoal, corn meal, oil meal, boiled potatoes, squash or any- 
thing that they will eat, but they should have a variety. Mix their mash 
with milk if you have it. After two weeks, feed this mash three times a 
week. Sometimes your hens will commence to lay before they are full 
feathered, under this treatment. 

Fanciers that are preparing their birds for an exhibit should pluck 
them at least two months before they place them on exhibition. They will 
have an entire new coat of feathers and they will score much higher as they 
will be in good condition, the feathers will be more even and the markings 
or'colors will be more uniform by their all coming in at once than if al- 
lowed to drop out and come in one at a time. This sounds reasonable, does 
it not? It does not hurt your fowls to pluck them when the feathers are 
ripe and ready to come out at a touch, not a bit more than it does a duck 
or a goose. Then why not aid nature at this period? 

After your fowls have gone through my method of forcing a 
molt, and begin to wear their new winter dress, their combs and 
wattles become red just like they do in the spring. They do not stand 
around all humped up for three months like they do if their feathers are 
left to come out of their own accord. They act like they were afraid of 
themselves for a few days, but soon come to the front for something to eat. 
If the feathers do not seem matured, and the skin bleeds, let those go till a 
little later in the season. July is the best time to pick your fowls, for the 
weather is warm and there will not be so much danger of them taking cold. 
Do not pick them on a rainy day. If fanciers would pluck their fowls just 
as soon as they are ready in July, then they will be in prime condition to 



CHICKS FKOM DYING IN THE SHELL 31 

place on exhibition in September. That is about the time that fairs and 
poultry shows commence. Put a little gasoline on a rag and rub over your 
fowls every morning while on exhibition; it will make their plumage shine 
so nice, and keep the lice from coming over on a visit from their next door 
neighbor. 

I find another advantage in plucking my fowls in July. Eggs are 
cheaper then than most any time during the year. Then you will get eggs 
when prices rule the highest. This is the most pleasing and profitable 
part of it all, for those who keep poultry for egg production. This year I 
plucked all of my chickens. I am getting an abundance of eggs and sell- 
ing them on the market for twenty-five cents per dozen. I did not get any 
eggs last year at this time except from the hens I had picked in July. 
Then I resolved to pick them all the next year, which I did with the above 
results. 

Try this method of forcing a molt, dear reader, and you will find that 
your fowls will enter the winter in better condition than fowls that have 
been starved to produce an early molt. Do not fail to give them a tonic in 
their drinking water. Give good sharp grit. Here is where we often make 
a mistake. When the ground is snow-covered the fowls cannot get grit un- 
less we have prepared it for them, and we often forget it until the ground 
is frozen and then we cannot procure it. Broken glass or chinaware makes 
a good substitute for grit. 

I saved all the nice clean feathers that I picked from my chickens 
and made pillows to lie on the porch for the men to use while taking a rest 
at noon. It is a great deal nicer to use them in this way than to have 
them scattered all over the poultry yards. 



The White of the Egg Makes the Chick 

During incubation the chick derives its nourishment from the white 
of the egg and not the yolk. The yolk has nothing to do with the forma- 
tion of the chick, but is the nutritious food which the newly hatched chick 
draws upon for sustenance during its early stages of existence. Conse- 
quently the chick requires no food until from twenty-four to thirty-six 
hours after being hatched. A chick can live without food for six days. 

If Fertile Eggs Are Wanted — If fertile eggs are wanted you should 
have at least one cockerel to twelve hens of the heavy breeds, but one 
cockerel to fifteen hens of the light weights, such as the Leghorns and 
Minorcas, are sufficient; they are a smaller fowl, but they have more vi- 
tality than the larger breeds. 



32 HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 



Find a Good Market and Meet Its Demands 

THERE is one thing that is of as great importance in the business of 
raising poultry as the feeding, breeding and management of the 
flock; it is the business of finding a good market and preparing the 
fowls for that market. It is true that anything that is well raised is 
half sold, but to say that anything is half sold is only half enough. We 
should be able to say that our stock is well fed, properly fitted and well 
sold. When we are able to reach this stage of the game then we are in a 
position to state what the possibilities of the business are. Remember 
that desirable goods always sell easiest. When market prices are ruling 
low, it is the best that obtains fair prices, while the culls are held over. 
The undesirable stuff should not be put upon the market; it will lower the 
standard of your better stuff. Keep the culls at home, feed them up and 
eat them, or sell on the home market, but do not ship them. This is not a 
matter of theory to be written on paper and to be read so as to enthuse 
people, but it should be put into practice, and those who put it into prac- 
tice soonest will be the ones to make business a success. In every market 
there are those who follow out these lines and the poultry buyers know 
them, and their goods are alwaj's satisfactory and in demand. Markets, 
as well as how to raise poultry, should be studied. This is a matter that 
has more importance attached to it than it is given credit for. Study the 
markets and try to meet them. 



How to Prepare Young Cockerels for Market 

IT is a waste of food to keep young cockerels after they weigh three or 
four pounds each, as they are sold as "old roosters" after their combs 
grow. In the market, old roosters bring from three to five cents per 
pound, while young ones often sell from fifteen to twenty cents per pound. 
The best way to prepare young cockerels for the market is to separate 
them from the hens. Nearly every one has an old building of some kind 
they do not use in summer. That will do to put them in. Peed them soft 
feed, such as meal, potatoes and bran mixed in a mash, salt this a little 
and you will be surprised how much they will gain in two weeks. It will 
pay you to try it. Give them some green food, such as lettuce or cabbage. 
They must have plenty of grit and pure, fresh water, or sweet skimmed 
milk is better. They will grow as fast as capons and be ready for the mar- 
ket in two or three weeks, I think that caponizing is a cruel practice and 
is unnecessary. 



CHICKS FROM DYING IN THE SHELL 



33 




Single Comb Brown Leghorns 

The acknowledged queen of the practical egg laying breeds is the 
Brown Leghorns when judged by the standard of the greatest number of 
marketable eggs produced at least cost. Not only are the hens persistent 
layers, but they are extremely active foragers and waste no time in setting. 
Like a good milch cow they put little fat upon their bones, but all surplus 
nourishment to egg production. The cost of growing them is compara- 
tively light; no more, perhaps, than one-half that of Brahma or Cochin. 



34 



HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 




Rose Comb Brown Leghorns 

For a handsome bird and for egg producers the Leghorn stands at the 
head. There is no breed of fowls that lay so many eggs with little feed. 
Both the Rose and Single Comb Leghorn were originally imported from 
Leghorn, a seaport in Italy (hence their name.) The Rose and Single Comb 
varieties are exactly alike in every respect except the comb. The Rose 
Comb Leghorns are of medium size, have beautiful gay plumage, white 
ear-lobes and yellow legs, are symmetrical in form and very active and 
pleasing in appearance, are very hardy and chicks are easily raised on free 
range; they are good foragers and pullets lay at an early age. 



CHICKS FROM DYING- IN THE SHELL 35 

Breeders and Success 

THE requirements of pure-bred poultry are constantly growing more 
and more imperative owing to the demand by the people generally, 
the farmer as well as the fancier. The tendency of competition 
certainly demonstrates this to be an age of necessity. Rewards are not to 
be accorded to the amount of noise we make, but to the quality of the ex- 
hibits; and certainly the more spirited the competition the better must be 
the systems adopted, the administrative ability of the poultry raiser being 
put to the test. Surely everyone will agree that the profits in any business 
are greater or smaller according to the management of that business, and 
we ought therefore to train ourselves to avoid all mistakes and calamities 
that have proved disadvantageous to success. 

One can start now with pure-bred poultry so much cheaper than they 
could a few years ago, as so many have them all over the country and you 
can get them by paying a few cents more per dozen for the eggs. 



Leghorns Not Good Setters 

Leghorns do not make good incubators; they are too nervous. One 
should always keep some Plymouth Rock hens to hatch their chicks, pro- 
vided they do not hatch by artificial incubation. 



Grow Speltz for Your Poultry 

SPELTZ is a new grain from Russia. It has been grown in the United 
States in a small way for several years, and each succeeding season 
not only emphasizes its value as a poultry food, but it is readily eaten 
by all kinds of stock. It is found to be adapted to a wide range of soil and 
climate; it resists drouth and will thrive on poor lands and is not readily 
damaged by harvest rains. It yields more per acre than wheat, oats, rye 
or barley. We raised last year sixty bushels per acre. This cereal is cov- 
ered with a shuck enclosing two kernels that resemble wheat when the 
shuck has been removed, but the kernel is larger, The head is just about 
as long as wheat and resembles it very much only on speltz two kernels 
grow together instead of one. It is the very best food for egg production 
that I have ever tried, except wheat. It is just as good as wheat and is a 
great deal cheaper, as you can grow so many more bushels per acre. It is 
a very rich food and should not be fed exclusively. It should be ground 
for little chicks. 



36 HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

Recipe for Keeping Eggs 

TO every three gallons of water add one pound of fresh slacked lime 
and one-half pint of salt. Have it well dissolved, drop in your eggs 
one at a time; mind, do not crack them. If you wish to keep them 
eight months or a year, you can do so, but you must use them or sell them 
as soon as taken out of the water, or they will spoil. When you have put 
in all you wish, take a thin piece of board and place on top of the eggs. Be 
sure they are all under the brine. Then cover the board with salt. Now 
place them in a cool cellar. Your eggs must be strictly fresh. It would be 
well to test them to make sure. This is a good way to keep eggs for win- 
ter's high prices. 



Talk on Incubators and Brooders 

TRYING to save a few dollars on the first cost of an incubator often 
results in a very large additional cost through failure on the part of 
those so called "cheap" machines to hatch more than half of the 
eggs, and when the eggs are worth more than the machine, which is true in a 
great many cases, the spoiling of ten or twelve dollars' wortnof eggs for the 
sake of saving two or three dollars on the first cost of an incubator is, to 
say the least, very doubtful economy. Never buy a machine just because 
it is cheap. It may cause you lots of grief and many disappointments. If 
you have never had experience with incubators and do not know how an 
incubator should be constructed to do good work, go to or write to some 
one that has had practical experience and good success with incubators — 
one in whom you have confidence and can trust. Ask their advice before 
purchasing a machine, then you will be sure to get a good one. Do not 
buy a sixty or hundred-egg incubator. You will have to spend as much 
time with a small one as you would with a large one. A large incubator 
will cost you a little more in the start, but will save you money in the end, 
for it takes more oil to operate a real small incubator than it does a big 
one. The more eggs you have in the incubator the more animal heat there 
is, which helps keep up the temperature. Then you will have more to show 
for your three weeks' work if you operate a 150 or 240 incubator. If 
you do not want that many chicks at one time, sell them to your neighbors 
to help defray expenses. 

One should have two brooders with each machine, because if you 
crowd your chicks they are more likely to become diseased than when they 
are kept in small numbers. You will have disentery to fight if you crowd 
your chicks. You should have a closed feed yard, like cut in this book, to 
attach to each brooder, provided you haven't got a brooder house. Fifty 
chicks will do better together than 100. It is their nature to crowd just 



CHICKS FROM DYING IN THE SHELL 37 

as close together as they can, and you are inviting disease when you put 
too many chicks in one brooder. Better put in just a few and raise them 
all, than to crowd them and lose the greater part of them. 



How to Build a Cheap Poultry House 

IN the first place you must keep your houses free from vermin, and when 
the nights begin to get cold and stormy, gather all of your chickens 
from the trees, sheds and out-buildings into the house you have pre- 
pared for their winter quarters. This house should be warm and roomy 
with windows to give light and sunshine. If you are a renter and haven't 
a warm house for your poultry, and the landlord does not feel disposed to 
build one for you, you can make a very comfortable house with a very 
little labor and no expense to speak of. If you offer to do the work the 
landlord will surely furnish the material. Piek out the location and meas- 
ure off the ground the size you want to build your house. Then set two 
rows of posts three feet apart, nail on some poles or old boards, then pack 
with straw, tramp it down hard so that the wind can not come through; 
la} r poles over the top and cover deep with straw or hay. Put enough on 
to shed the rain; put your window and door in the south side, and you will 
find you have a very comfortable house for your poultry. If the mites 
bother in summer, just throw out the straw packing and fill with new; burn 
the straw you take out so as to destroy the mites. Sprinkle Lice Killer all 
over the house and paint the roosts with it several times during the sum- 
mer and you will have no trouble. Whitewash your nests with lime and 
sprinkle air-slacked lime over the floor of your hen house. It will keep 
your fowls healthy and help to rid your house of mites and lice. There is 
no one plan that could be given to build a good poultry house that would 
suit everyone. It will depend entirely on the location and the pocketbook. 
The papers are full of plans. Pick out one that suits your demands and 
means, but plaster the house by all means. 



Poultry Industry 



IT is possible that if an accurate census of poultry and eggs could be 
taken it would be found that the value thereof would exceed $300,000,- 
000. This throws the "fancy" part far into the shade. The great 
trainloads of poultry and eggs going to the large cities are what show the 
magnitude of the poultry interests. Then there is also the large number 
of eggs used in the arts. In the face of a great array of figures and facts, 
let the poultry business have its proper place, for it is the rival of any 
other. Cattle, horses, sheep, swine, and even wheat are falling to the rear 
of poultry. 



38 



HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 







Buff Cochins 

These are large massive fowls, profusely feathered, and have a very 
fine carriage. They are good layers, and will, under favorable circum- 
stances, compare with the Leghorn class for winter laying, while for a 
market fowl they far exceed them. Like all Asiatics, they are rather later 
in maturing than those of the American class. They are heavily feathered 
and well adapted to cold climates. They breed true to color and are very 
docile fowls; can be easily yarded by a low fence and wire netting. 



CHICKS FROM DYING IN THE SHELL 39 

Bill for Closed Feed Yard 

One board 1x10 sixteen feet S. 1 S. for sides, cut in two. 
Four boards ten-inch shiplap sixteen feet, for floors and sheeting. 
One board ten-inch shiplap 12 feet, for ends. 
One board 1x14 eight feet long S. 2 S., for door. 
One board 1x6 eight feet, above the door to receive hinges. 
Two pairs three-inch strap hinges, three for top door and one for 
little door. 

Three window panes 7x14. Place these in the top door. 
One piece of sheet iron eight feet long, for covering. 

This size feed yard will accommodate as many chicks as you would dare 
put in one brooder. If you use a small brooder, say fifty or seventy-five 
chick capacity, you can make a smaller feed yard, say one-half as large. 

On a great many farms one can find enough short pieces of boards to 
make a part of this feed yard, such as sheeting, ends and floor. The floor 
can be made of short pieces of common boards, put in crosswise instead of 
lengthwise, and stripped to keep out the cold. It does not need to be very 
high. Put a piece of oilcloth over the crack of the door and under the 
sheet iron to shed the rain. Tack this oilcloth to door and under sheet 
iron. (See cut.) This brooder attachment, or closed feed yard, is the finest 
thing I have ever used. It is a creation of my own, and it does away with 
the expense of a brooder-house. Your chicks do better and are more com- 
fortable than they would be in a large brooder-house, the expense is noth- 
ing compared to that of a building of that kind and it will accommodate as 
many chicks as you would dare put in one brooder. It is 3x8 feet, ten 
inches high and you can attach it to any brooder. It does not take so much 
capital to start in the poultry business when a closed feed yard is used in- 
stead of a brooder-house. 

You should place the feed, water and chaff in the feed yard instead of 
the brooder, then your brooder will never get sour, which invites disease. 
The feed yard is very easily cleaned. You run the little chicks in the 
brooder, providing it is too cold to let outside, then clean the feed yard 
with a broom. In five minutes time you can clean it. Sprinkle a little 
air-slacked lime on the floor while it is damp, sweep it around a little. 
This will answer for a whitewashing and keeps the feed yard sweet and 
kills any disease germs that may be lurking there. I also clean my brooders 
in the same way. I burn sulphur in the brooders and feed yards twice a 
week. 

The feed yard, likewise the brooders, should be covered with sheet iron, 
for your chicks must be kept dry. If they are covered with sheet iron or 
tin, it doesn't matter what kind of weather we have, they are perfectly safe 
for days. I have kept my chicks in the brooder and feed yard for two 



40 HOW TO HATCH, BBOOD, FEED AND PEEVENT 

weeks in bad weather, and they were as comfortable as could be. They 
are safe from vermin, too, for nothing can get into this roosting place. 
One great advantage in having a feed yard is, the chicks have so much 
room, and the stronger ones do not trample the weak ones to death as they 
would if confined in the brooder any length of time. I never let my chicks 
out in the morning until the dew is all off the grass. I place the water and 
feed in the closed feed yard in the evening, after the chicks have gone to 
roost in the brooder. I sweep the feed yard first, if it needs it, place food, 
put more chaff and grit in, then close the door until morning. All I have 
to do in the morning is to open the little door between the feed yard and 
the brooder, and let my chicks out into the feed yard to their feed. I turn 
up the flame of the brooder lamp a little, so it will make it more comforta- 
ble in the feed yard, then I go about my work and do not pay any more at- 
tention to them until after the sun comes out warm and the dew is all gone, 
when I open the feed yard door and let them out. That is why I can raise 
so many chickens. This feed yard saves so much time; it is fine to put 
your chicks in after you wean them from the brooder. It is large and can ac- 
commodate almost a hundred grown fowls. In early spring I sometimes place 
a jug of 'hot water in the feed yard early in the morning, but this is not 
necessary only in cold weather. You should have two feed yards to each 
brooder, so you can use one for your three-weeks-old chicks that you have 
just taken from the brooder, to roost in so you can have the brooder for the 
next hatch. Be sure to close the little door between the feed yard and 
brooder at night so that the heat may be all retained in the brooder to 
keep the chicks comfortable. This feed yard and brooder can be moved to 
any part of the farm in just a few minutes. Sometimes it becomes neces- 
sary to move your chicks, so as to avoid disease. For the health of your 
flock, your brooder should be moved to a clean place often. Choose a nice 
grassy spot if possible. An orchard is a fine place and gives the necessary 
shade, which is very essential for the welfare of your little chicks in 
extreme warm weather. 




Feed Yard and Brooder— Open. 




Feed Yard and Brooder— Closed. 



Diseases and Their Remedies 



Mrs. Johnson's Poultry Compound 

Sure Cure for Bowel Trouble in 
Brooder Chicks 

I HAVE experimented for years to produce a remedy that would be a 
sure cure for bowel trouble in brooder chicks. Bowel trouble kills 

more chicks from ten days to four weeks old than die from any other 
cause. I have at last succeeded in producing a compound that is the best 
and cheapest of any remedy ever placed upon the market. It is not only a 
cure for bowel trouble, but it will cure roup, swelled heads and eyes, dysen- 
tery, crop-bound, leg weakness, cholera, and in fact every disease common 
among poultry; it will also keep your fowls in good condition, stimulate egg 
production, and for molting fowls it is indispensible. This is a critical time 
and fowls should have some kind of tonic to assist nature at this period. 
This compound is also good for wire cuts, sore shoulders and itch in horses 
and will cure foot rot in cattle; we use it for chapped hands, cold sores, cuts 
and bruises with good results. 

I hatch and raise chickens by the thousands; have hatched as many as 
1,087 chicks in one day. You can do the same, dear reader, by the help of 
this book, my Compound, good incubators, good brooders and good feed 
yards. 

There are so many fakes in the world that I do not wonder if you doubt 
me capable of doing all I claim, but no one can give better references than 
these: State Bank of Maxwell, Maxwell, Iowa; editor of Maxwell Tribune, 
Maxwell, Iowa; First National Bank, Nevada, Iowa; editor Nevada Repre- 
sentative, Nevada, Iowa. These people have known me nearly all their 
lives. Write them. 

If you bought this compound of companies that make a business of 
putting up compounds, the amount I will sell you for fifty cents would 
cost you just $4.00, for they put it up in liquid form and sell it for fifty 
cents a pint. 



Directions for Preparing Compound 

To one 50 cent package of Mrs. Johnson's Poultry Compound add four 
quarts of water, after the compound is all dissolved then bottle it up and 
it is ready for use. 



42 HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

Directions for Using— For a tonic to keep your poultry in good con- 
dition and stimulate egg production one teaspoonful to two quarts of 
water; for sick chicks one teaspoonful to one quart of water, if the chicks 
are very sick one teaspoonful to one pint of water; fowls with swelled heads 
and eyes, put one teaspoonful in one pint of water, wash their heads all 
over good and remove the matter from their eyes, put some of the liquid 
in their eyes after being reduced. Repeat this three times a day till they 
are well. Put some of the Compound in every thing you feed them, also 
in the drink you give them, whether milk or water; use a different cloth 
for washing each fowl, then burn it, this will prevent spreading disease. 
All affected fowls should be separated from the flock. Roup is treated 
in the same way, only you remove the cankers with a toothpick, then put 
some of the Compound quite strong, but not full strength, in their mouths 
with a feather, if you will commence in time and go according to direc- 
tions you will save every fowl. To make a wash for sore shoulders, wire 
cuts and itch in horses put one teaspoonful of the compound (after being 
made into liquid according to above directions) into a half pint of water 
and wash the affected parts four or five times a day; to kill proud flesh ap- 
ply the liquid full strength, with a feather, there is nothing that will keep 
down blood poison better than this wash. For chapped hands, cold sores, 
cuts and bruises put one teaspoonful of the liquid in one-half pint of 
water, the only objection to using this wash, it stains the skin a little, but 
can be readily removed with citric acid or lemon juice. 

If you bought this Compound of companies that make a business of 
putting up compounds, the amount I will sell you for fifty cents, would 
cost you just $4.00, for they put it up in liquid form and sell it for fifty 
cents a pint. Now, friends, to prove to you that my Compound will do all 
I claim for it and more, on receipt of a stamped envelope and address, I 
will send a trial package of the Compound that will make one quart of 
liquid compound, then write me the results, please. At the price you 
cannot afford to do without this, it is a whole apothecary shop of itself, it 
is not only one ingredient, but many, that is why it will cure so many 
different diseases. Write me today. I can offer nothing more fair. 

Mrs. Rebecca Johnson, Maxwell, Iowa. 



Cure for Dysentery in Chicks 

Cure for dysentery in chicks: One teaspoonful of acetate of iron, to each 
quart of water. Directions for using: One teaspoonful to one quart of 
water. Keep it before the fowls as long as they are affected. 

Use the above until you can procure some of Mrs. Johnson's Com- 
pound, which is the best thing you can use for bowel trouble in brooder 
chicks. 



CHICKS FROM DYING IN THE SHELL 43 

A Good Tonic for Poultry 

Generally called Douglass Mixture. 

A good and cheap tonic for chickens is composed of one pound of cop- 
peras, two gallons of soft water and one ounce of sulphuric acid, a tea- 
spoonful being added to each quart of drinking water. This should be 
kept in a jug and properly labeled "poison." 



Grit for Poultry 

Grit is absolutely necessary for poultry. It should be kept with 
crushed oyster shell and charcoal in boxes constantly before them. They 
must have something during confinement in bad weather, especially, to en- 
able them to assimilate their food. Broken crockery or china make good 
grit if gravel cannot be obtained Oyster shell is indispensible. 



Dust Bath 

A dust bath should be provided in one corner of a room, well supplied 
with air. This bath should consist of slacked lime, ashes, road dust, a 
little sulphur and a little lice killer sprinkled over it. 

Put one teaspoonful of Mrs. Johnson's Compound in each quart of 
water and give to chicks with dysentery. It is a good tonic at any time. 



Over=fat Fowls 

Do not keep your breeding stock too fat, as the eggs from fat fowls 
give poor hatches. Give fowls plenty of exercise. If birds have free range 
feed but once a day; if no range is available feed fresh, clean food three 
times a day and feed plenty of green stuff, lettuce, cabbage, celery, or any- 
thing that they will eat. Give plenty of fresh water three times a day. 
Cut straw, leaves or hay should be thrown upon the floor to the depth of 
three or four inches and in this the food thrown, to encourage exercise. 



Charred Bone 

Charred bone as well as charred corn is good for poultry, for the sake 
of the charcoal it contains, which is very beneficial to them in aiding diges- 
tion; but charred bone does not possess the full value of raw bone on ac- 



44 HOW TO HATCH, BKOOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

count of the animal matter contained in the latter, which is consumed in 
the charring process. Fresh bones when ground are the most valuable. 

Boiled oats are good for chickens in winter, especially if you are feed- 
ing for egg production. It is a good feed at any time, much better when 
boiled than fed dry. 



Diarrhoea and How to Treat It 

Diarrhoea in fowls is caused by worms, cholera, indigestion, lice, con- 
gestion or over-feeding. 

Treatment — Seek the cause and remove it, if possible. A feed of corn 
meal and bran, made damp with a tea stewed from boiling white oak bark 
or blackberry roots will usually allay the trouble. Feed this for several 
days. Camphor is also good. I sometimes mix Venetian red in their feed; 
it is a mineral and is good for indigestion. It should be fed to your hens 
twice or three times a week. Put Douglass mixture in the drinking water 
once a day at least. This is composed of one pound of copperas to two gal- 
lons of water. After this dissolves add one ounce of sulphuric acid. Keep 
in a jug; give a teaspoonful in a quart of water. (This receipt will be 
found on another page in this book.) Put remedy in a jug, for the action 
of the acid on tin would soon eat a hole through it. If this does not cure 
your fowls, write the author of this book for a trial package of her Poultry 
Compound. An addressed and stamped envelope is all it will cost you. 



Apoplexy 

This disease occurs among fowls that are very fat. The heavier breeds 
are most liable to suffer. The attack is sudden, no previous illness being 
shown. Fowls suffering from apoplexy often drop from the perch dead, or 
are found dead on the nest or expire from some slight exertion. 

Treatment — Cut down the amount of food, especially fat-forming 
food, such as corn, and compel the birds to take exercise. Laxatives also 
are of advantage. A dram of sulphate of soda dissolved in a small amount 
of water and used to moisten the food for twenty to thirty chickens acts 
nicely as a laxative. 

You will find remedies advertised in this book that are good for all 
diseases. 

Globular salts in the water once a week will keep your chickens 
healthy. Look for lice and mites every day. They can soon get away with 
a brood of little chicks; they can soon sap the vitality of your hens and 
make them an expense to you instead of a profit. 



CHICKS FROM DYING IN THE SHELL 



45 




Black Langshans 

Langshans were originally imported from China and are today one of 
the most popular fowls in the Orient. No variety of fowls ever gained pop- 
ularity faster since their importation. The Langshans are large, stylish 
birds, with full, broad breasts, small wings and erect, small combs; their 
bright red wattles, ear lobes and combs, glowing against their glossy black 
feathers, form a striking contrast. 



46 



HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 




Light Brahmas 

The Light Brahma, by unchallenged right, stands at the head of all 
thoroughbred poultry. During the past thirty years, while other breeds 
have had their "ups and downs," the Light Brahmas have stood their own 
ground, and today they are as much praised and as highly recommended 
to the general breeder as they were thirty years ago. Any breed that can 
stand the test of rivalry so long and still continue to satisfy and please the 
thousands breeding them, must have qualities of a high order. They are 
the largest of all our poultry, and furnish more pounds of flesh and eggs 
in twelve months than any other breed of fowls on earth. When full 
grown the cocks weigh twelve pounds and the hens ten. They are well 
adapted for all purposes, and are so gentle, handsome and practical, one 
cannot help but like them. 



CHICKS FKOM DYING IN THE SHELL 47 

Cholera 

Symptoms — The first indication of disease may be shown by the bird 
appearing slow and indifferent, remaining alone, half asleep, with drooping 
wings. The head is pale or bluish white. The excretions, which in health 
are white, are tinged with yellow. 

Causes — This disease generally arises from filth, lice, poor ventilation, 
over-crowding, improper food, filthy water, etc. 

Prevention and Cuke — Heat destroys the cholera germ. If the food 
or drink be boiled and fed from vessels cleansed with boiling water it will 
remove this source of infection. All healthy birds should be removed from 
the infected pen. Remove all the droppings or other filth. Whitewash 
the house and roosts, cover the floor with lime and ashes: then burn sul- 
phur every few days until the disease disappears. Keep the sick fowls 
away from the pen or house. 

Treatment— Give a teaspoonful of castor oil to each fowl and feed 
just the same as for diarrhoea; give Douglass mixture to drink; give oil 
once in two days. 



Cure for Scaly Legs 

If your chickens have rough, scaly legs, put some kerosene in a can 
and hold their feet and legs in it for about five minutes. If the first appli- 
cation does not cure them repeat it once or twice more if necessary. This 
disease iscaused by a parasite and is readily cured with kerosene. You 
can cure the bumble foot in the same manner. The bumble foot causes 
the feet to swell and the fowl will get very lame and will finally droop and 
die if not cured. It is contagious and should be treated at once. 



Crop Bound 

This disease arises from taking too much or too course food into the 
crop; it is frequently the result of an abnormal appetite from deranged di- 
gestion or lack of variety of food. 

Treatment — A little oil and tepid water should be poured down the 
throat and the mass in the crop kneaded gently to aid in breaking it up. 
A small quantity of soda dissolved in water will prevent fermentation of 
the food in the crop. If the mass does not leave the crop within three 
hours, it may be necessary to cut through and remove the contents. Cut 
as high as possible so that the food taken afterwards, which should be lim- 
ited for a few days, will not escape. Sew the crop and skin separate. The 



48 HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

fowl will be all right in a few days. I have often treated fowls this way, 
with good success. Peed plenty of crushed oyster shell and sharp grit at 
all times. This will prevent fowls' crops from becoming bound. Give cop- 
peras or Mrs. Johnson's Compound in their water every few days. 



Cure for Roup 

The roup is a very dangerous disease, and a hen with roup may spread 
the contagion by drinking water from the same receptacle as the others, for 
the exudation spreads out on the water. Hens sleep with their heads un- 
der their wing and the pus that comes from their eyes and nose stick 
to the small feathers. These come out and other hens that pick at the 
feathers will get tlmroup. The only way to prevent this is to separate the 
sick from the well fowls and clean up the coop thoroughly. Close up all 
the cracks as they are a fruitful source of roup. In cold weather close 
your coop so that no cracks are open, and when the weather is warm keep 
the door of the coop wide open. The sick fowls must be kept in a warm 
place until they recover. Bathe tneir heads with warm water, then grease 
their heads and throat with kerosene and lard, equal parts; give each sick 
fowl a teaspoonful of castor oil; feed them a warm mash of bran, cut grass 
or clover, meal, a little onion and meat scraps If they are very sick cut 
their heads off and burn them; do not throw their carcass where other hens 
can pick at them. 

If the above does not help your fowls, send a stamped and addressed 
envelope for a trial package of Mrs. Johnson's Poultry Compound, or send 
fifty cents and I will send you enough compound to make one gallon of 
medicine. This compound I guarantee to cure roup, cholera and diarrhoea 
in old and young fowls, if given in time. 



Poultry Hints 



Feed alfalfa meal in winter. 

Air castles like eggs are easily crushed. 

All classes of poultry are fond of fresh ground bone. 

Close application to every detail makes success sure. 

Grit, fresh water and bone meal for health and eggs. 

Hot, strong whitewash on a wall is light, sweet and cheap. 

Allowing the fowls to drink impure water is inviting disease. 

Have all brood coops well made, as they should last for years. 

In the poultry business, common sense is the thing most needed. 

The chick whose life blood is being sucked by vermin cannot thrive. 

A saturated solution of boracic acid is good for swelled heads and eyes. 

Clean, dry quarters are needed for health in summer as well as in 
winter. 

Raw corn meal mixed up with water is not a proper food for young 
chicks. 

Scatter fresh slacked lime liberally over the hen house; it will aid in 
preventing disease. 

Keep your poultry house clean. Then you will always have healthy 
chickens. 

Flat perches are best, because they are more comfortable for the feet 
of the fowls. 

-rDark-shelled eggs have proved harder to test for fertility than light- 
shelled ones. 

Slacked lime placed in the drinking vessels will often cure the hens of 
laying eggs shell-less. 

Insect depredations are like weeds; they can be kept in check by pre- 
venting their getting a start. 

Ducks are cholera proof, roup proof, gape proof and hawk proof, but 
will sometimes die of spinal meningitis and paralysis. 



50 HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

Always arrange the nests so that the hens can step in rather than 
jump down; they are apt to break their eggs in jumping down. 

For the good of the flock remove any fowl that shows any signs of 
being sick, even if the ailment is slight; it may save you a lot of grief. 

There is not very much danger of overfeeding chicks after they are 
four weeks old, but they should be fed in some place to which laying hens 
do not have access. 

Remember to keep the poultry house clean and free from filth of all 
kinds. Filth is the source of most diseases. Lice will account for what 
filth is not responsible for. 

There is a mistake made in buying extremely heavy weights for breed- 
ing Select birds about the standard weight for the chosen breed and get 
them thick- fleshed and solid. 

Shut up the hen house as tight as possible, occasionally, and burn sul- 
phur in it; the fumes will reach every crack and crevice and be death to 
disease and vermin hidden there. 

There is no food as corrective in the way of a digestive that equals 
charcoal. It is easily obtained because various forms of the article may be 
made by the poultry raiser himself. 

Poultry in the orchards, in addition to thriving themselves, are of 
great benefit to the orchard in that they destroy insects, bugs and worms, 
and keep the trees in good condition. 

The swill barrel and often the slop pail have proved a watery grave for 
many a fine chick. Covers over them will prevent this. Moreover, cov- 
ered barrels and pails attract less flies than uncovered ones. 

Incubators that have been used all season should receive a good, care- 
ful cleaning and be well aired and sunned before storing away. If your 
incubator is a hot water machine, be sure the pipes are all perfectly dry. 

Do not put a floor in the poultry house if it is possible to have a per- 
fectly dry one without it. If dampness is likely to get in, make a cement 
floor and keep it covered with litter of some kind— straw, leaves or hay. 

The road to success in poultry keeping which reaches the goal of profit 
is not all smooth and level. When the road is most difficult the owners 
must drive; for personal observation is necessary to avoid rocks that wreck. 

The every day welfare of the hen is a matter of method. Every streak 
of ill luck that has assailed your ambitions can be traced to something 
neglected, and that streak of ill luck can be traced to ourselves, but we do 
not like to admit it. 



CHICKS FROM DYING IN THE SHELL 51 

Salt is an essential part of the poultry ration. One of the best ways to 
give it is to mix it with soft food. In this way it will make the food more 
palatable as well as assist in digestion and keep the hens in good condition. 
A small quantity daily is much better in every way than a large quantity 
occasionally. 

Always keep the hens supplied with green food as late in the season as 
it can possibly be done by turning them out to secure any such that may 
be within their reach. When the supply is failing put cabbage in the 
poultry yard. After snow covers the ground, feed alfalfa meal, fine chaff 
or sweepings of the hay loft. 

A bone cutter was once thought a luxury, but is now considered an 
absolute necessity. You can not make a commercial success of poultry 
without one. If you feed green cut bone to your fowls, the increase in the 
egg product will pay for a bone cutter in a very short time, besides it will 
keep up the vitality of your breeding stock and make more fertile eggs. 

Worms in the windpipe are the cause of gaps. One can ofttimes re- 
move them with a horse hair. Double the horse hair and make a loop, in- 
sert it into the windpipe, then draw it out, repeat this several times. If 
the worms are not too far down the windpipe, you can get them every one. 
You cannot give your fowls medicine strong enough to remove the 
worms without injury to the bird. 

There is one valuable advantage of keeping poultry on the farm that 
is generally overlooked and that is the vast number of insects destroyed 
by them. If you will plant plum trees around your poultry house you will 
alway have plums. The hens destroy the larvae of insects that infest 
plum trees. The trees furnish shade that is very necessary for chickens 
in hot weather. You should utilize every foot of ground in a poultry yard 
for fruit trees. 

Dear reader, are you desirous of bettering your condition financially 
and thus enjoy a little more of this world's happiness, seeing your family 
prosperous and contented and adding each day a little more to this world's 
store? Would you like a business in which you can become your own 
master, direct your own affaire and in short be independent? If so, I 
would advise you to go into the poultry business. There is more profit in 
it considering the money invested and the labor required, than in any other 
enterprise you can engage in. It takes a young fortune to equip yourself 
for farming, and another fortune to pay rent. And what have you left at 
the end of the year after your expenses are ail paid? A meager living, 
lost hopes, a discouraged soul, and a yearning for something better. 



Give Your Boys and Girls a Chance 




Mrs. Rebecca Johnson and Her Little Daughters, Veta and Bessie 
and their Ducks. 



THIS is the picture of myself and two little girls, Veta and Bessie, and 
their ducks. Last spring my little girls asked me if they could raise 
some ducks and have the money they received for them when sold, 
for their very own. They had some money which they had earned build- 
ing fires at the school house, and doing odd jobs at home for which they 
would receive a nickle or a dime. This was all put together in a pocket- 
book which they called their bank. In February they sent an order to 
Des Moines, for a trio of Pekin ducks for which they paid |7.00, includ- 
ing the freight. This they thought was pretty high, but they wanted 
to start right and wanted the best they could get. They received fine 
birds. Then we bought an incubator and every morning they would 
gather the eggs early so they would not chill. They placed them in bas- 
kets and turned them once each day. They did this without being told. 
I set the incubator and lifted the trays; they filled the lamps and watched 
the thermometer, and kept the egg chamber at the proper temperature for 
incubation. They did this just as well as I could have done it. When the 
ducks began to hatch how delighted the girls were. They would stand in 
front of the incubator and look at them through the glass and talk all 
sorts of baby talk, telling them what they would do for them as soon as 
they would be able to leave the machine. They never took one-half the 



CHICKS FROM DYING IN THE SHELL 53 

pleasure with all their dolls as they did with those ducks. They hatched 
some of th'e ducks with hens. The girls fed, brooded and took all the 
care of them. I paid no attention whatever to them and the result was 
they sold fifty-six dollars' worth and kept thirteen ducks for breeding pur- 
poses. O, the air castles they are building for another year! 

Mothers, try your little girls and boys in this work; it will surprise you 
what an interest they will take and how many steps they will save you 
during the summer, besides the practical knowledge they will gain that 
will help them in after life. We have their music lessons and musical in- 
struments to pay for anyway. Why not give them a chance to earn the 
money to pay for a part of these at least. They will practice more econ- 
omy in spending the money they earn themselves than if it came direct 
from us. They will also take more interest in their music and try harder to 
learn when they pay for the lessons with their own money. This is not 
all. It will be an advantage to them to learn things along this line while 
we are here to teach them. Labor rarely becomes irksome to children 
when they are personally interested in it, knowing they will receive the 
profits derived therefrom. 



Testimonial Letters to Mrs* Johnson 



THE following letters received by Mrs Rebecca Johnson are an indica- 
tion of the appreciation people have of her knowledge on the subject 
of manipulating incubators and raising chickens: 

Nevada, Feb. 3, 1905. — Dear Mrs. Johnson: I feel as if I must write 
and thank you for the letter you wrote me how to run an incubator. I 
used to read all the books and papers about poultry and incubators that I 
could get, but your one instructive letter had more valuable information in 
it than all papers and poultry books I ever read. It told me everything 
in plain words, just what I needed to know. I think that the failure in 
incubators are due to improper instructions sent out with the machines. 
The first time I started my incubator I ran it according to the directions I 
received with my incubator, and failed. I only got forty-four chicks from 
230 eggs; I became very much discouraged for I wanted early chicks, but 
when I read in the papers about your success I thought I would write and 
ask you how you managed your incubator, and received your letter just in 
time to save my second hatch; this time I got 146 healthy chicks and the 
third time I got 164. I hatched quite a few under hens for I wanted the 
hens to raise the incubator chicks. In all I raised about 500 chicks. It 
was late in the season when I got your letter; next spring I will start my 
incubator early and try to raise twice as many. I have a brooder, but I 
do not know how to use it; I wish you would be so kind as to give me 
instructions how to operate it also; it would be so much easier than to 
bother with hens. I have a nice flock of Langshans. I like them the best 
of any kind we ever had. Please answer soon. 

Prom your friend, 

Mrs. L. C. Rierson. 



Colo, Iowa, May 23, 1904. — My Dear Mrs. Johnson: I received 
your kind letter and will say I was glad to hear from you for your letter 
did me so much good. I have been waiting to see what kind of a hatch I 
would have. Well, I was happily surprised. I hatched 380 chicks from 
400 eggs. This is the best I have ever done. Prom the hatch just before 
this I got only 132 chicks from 400 eggs. This was before I received your 
letter. I operated the ventilator just as you told me. If everyone knew 
just how to operate their incubator and have as good success as I did, they 
would be spared lots of grief and many disappointments. I wish you would 



CHICKS FROM DYING IN THE SHELL 55 

write me again and tell me anything you think I ought to know. I am 
always ready and willing to learn. When I read of your success, I wondered 
how you managed your incubator for such good results, but when I read 
your instructions, how easy it was for me to operate my incubator. I wish 
I could sell my incubator; it is almost too large for me since I can hatch so 
many chicks at once. It is a good machine and if a person will follow your 
instructions they can hatch more chicks than they can take care of. As I 
know how to operate an incubator now, a smaller one will do me just as 
well or better, than a large one. My family is small, only my husband and 
myself, but I want to raise at least 500 hens for next year. I think it is the 
duty of every woman to do all she can to help make a livelihood, don't you? 
And they can help more by raising poultry than any other way. It is a 
work I dearly love. I would like to meet you and have a talk with you. 
Thanking you again for your kindness, I remain 

Yours very respectfullp, 

Mrs. Ed. Day. 



Colo, Iowa, Oct. 10, 1905.— My Dear Mrs. Johnson : Please send me 
another fifty cents worth of your Poultry Compound. We have hatched 
at least one-fourth more chicks since you showed us how to put those extra 
ventilators in our incubator. I do, indeed, feel grateful to you. Your 
book is certainly a wonderful help to chicken raisers, no more so than your 
Compound. I am glad there is some one coming to the front to help us 
women in poultry raising, for men have so much help in their stock raising 
and one is just as essential as the other, don't you think so? We have had 
good success with our poultry this summer. Please send the Compound 
by return mail and oblige, 

Yours respectfully, 

Mrs. John Connoly. 



Kalona, Iowa, Sept. 22, 1905. — Mrs. D. C. Johnson, Maxwell, Iowa: 
Kind Friend — Well, I will at last write and let you know that I received 
the money all right. I simply put off writing from one day to the next, and 
so time went. I had a letter from my daughter, telling me that she saw 
you at the fair. She also sent me your card and the price of your poultry 
tonic. You please send me a package for the stamps enclosed. We have 
sold enough young chickens to pay all our expenses and have about 200 
young chickens left for clear profit. My success is all due to you and your 
valuable instruction book, I am well pleased with the incubators I bought 
of you. Of course, we have not the numbers you are used to raising, but I 
am proud of my success as a beginner with an incubator. Have you the 
pure bred Plymouth Rock cockerels, and if so what are your prices?^ 1 did 



56 HOW TO HATCH, BKOOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

not expect the dollar back on the incubator; only the freight. I thank you 
very much for the same and for all favors you have done for me. 

Yours respectfully, 

Mrs. Barbara Kemhf. 



Nevada, Iowa, Sept. 20, 1905. — Dear Mrs. Johnson: You gave me a 
trial package of your poultry compound at the fair. I know it helped my 
chickens, so I will enclose enough to pay for your poultry book and 
fifty cents worth of your Compound. Please send at once for I want to 
keep right on with the Compound until the chickens are well. 

Yours very respectfully, 

Mrs. Annie Miller. 



Button Willow, Colo. — My Dear Mrs. Johnson: Your nice letter 
and valuable book received. I did enjoy your nice letter so much and 
thank you for your interest. I know you have wondered at my delay. En- 
closed please find the money order for the book. Thanking you for your 
favors, I am 

Your friend, 

Mrs. William Tracy. 



Center Point, Iowa, Nov. 15, 1905. — My Dear Mrs- Johnson: Your 
Compound is all right and I want you to send me fifty cents worth by return 
mail. My chickens are getting all right and they are commencing to lay, all 
from the sample you sent me. 

Yours respectfully, 

Zona Haines. 



Woodward, Iowa, Oct. 5, 1905. — Mrs. D. C. Johnson, Dear Friend: 
I am so thankful for your book and your instructions. I never found any- 
thing that did me so much good in regard to poultry raising. I found 
your Compound to be just what we need to raise chicks. I had a flock of 
seventy chicks that were dying at the rate of four and five a day. I gave 
your Compound according to directions and only lost two after that. I 
would not try to raise chickens without it. I wish I could tell every one 
that has trouble in raising chickens about it. 

From your friend, 

Mrs. Lewis Johnson, 



CHICKS FROM DYING IN THE SHELL 57 



Things to Remember 



The mongrel is a thing of the past in profitable poultry culture. 

It is the little things well looked after in the poultry business that 
assures success. 

The eager, active, hungry hen is the profit maker. Lazy chickens, like 
lazy people, are worthless. 

Things should not be done by halves in the poultry business. If it is 
right, do it right; if it is wrong, leave it undone. 

The world is full of hopeless failures which could have been successes 
had they devoted to real work one-half the energy devoted to complaining. 

If you have poor incubators, poor brooders and poor instructions, I 
would advise you to let the poultry business alone, for failure is sure to be 
the result. 

Do not buy poor musty grain just because you can get it cheap. It 
lacks nutriment and often causes sickness in your flock, especially among 
the young chicks. 

If you start in the poultry business and make a failure of it do not give 
up in dispair, but find the cause and remove it if possible. Others have 
succeeded, so can you. 

For a cold there is nothing better than a little kerosene in the water 
you give your fowls. It removes the secretions in the head and removes 
the phlegm in their throat. 

Lice multiply with wonderful rapidity, and unless checked, a hundred 
will soon grow to a million. Conquer these before they get well started, if 
you would avoid ruin to your poultry prospects. 

The common life of every day, with its cares, necessities, and duties, 
afford ample opportunity for acquiring experience of the best kind and its 
most beaten paths provide the most true worker with abundant scope for 
effort and room for self improvement. 



Poultry Culture, Incubators, Brooders 

Their Advantages on the Farm and 
the Profit Derived Therefrom <£ <£ 

Paper Read By Mrs. Rebecca "Johnson, at the Farmers' Institute, Maxwell, 
Wednesday, January 25, tgoj. 

I DO not know that I can explain poultry culture, incubators, brooders 
and their advantages on the farm and the profits derived therefrom as 

well as those who have more literary ability, although I have made 
these a study for over twenty years. However, I will try to explain it to 
you to the best of my ability. 

The people that are making money in this progressive age are those 
who have the foresight to use the most improved facilities; those who fail 
are those who neglect their opportunities. Success in any branch of agri- 
culture seems to depend upon the effort that one makes to utilize the most 
modern machinery and methods. 

The hen is a very good hatching machine, but very slow. Very few 
people who depend upon the hen for hatching are able to make a commer- 
cial success of poultry; it is like making butter from a large herd of well 
fed cows, with the old fashioned up and down churn, or dropping corn by 
hand and covering it with a hoe, and then cultivating it with one horse 
and a single shovel plow as our fathers used to do. 'Tis true they made 
good butter, and raised good corn in those days, but could a man make a 
livelihood for a large family raising corn in that way today? No, we must 
have labor saving machinery, hence the incubator and brooder. They are 
the poultry man's labor saving machines; they enable him to do business on 
a large enough scale to make money, besides a living, and this is not all; 
eggs command a good price and are ready sale for cash, all the year around, 
consequently, we cannot afford to let old Biddy waste her time and energy 
setting and raising a brood when we can do it just as well for her, while she 
is laying the golden egg that fills our incubators, pays our store bills, and 
furnishes a nice boiled or fried egg for breakfast. No experienced poultry- 
man at the present time will undertake to rear fowls in large numbers for 
the production of eggs and depend on the hen that lays the egg for incu- 
bation, because those Mediterranean breeds, or non-setters as they are 
usually called, such as the Leghorn and Minorcas cannot be depended upon 
for natural incubation, consequently, artificial incubation must be resorted 
to if we would make poultry culture for egg producing a success. Leg- 



CHICKS FROM DYING IN THE SHELL 59 

horns and Minorcas never become broody the first year, and seldom the 
second. They do not make good incubators because they are too nervous. 
If you go near the nests where they are setting they will fly off like "a shot 
out of a gun," and often break their eggs. I set every hen t'hat became 
broody last summer on duck eggs, and then did not have enough, so I 
thought I would force some to set, but they set standing every time, hence, 
you see, if I had not resorted to artificial incubation to hatch my chicks, I 
would have (excuse slang, please) "come out of the little end of the horn," 
and missed all those nice fried chickens, f>250 and 500 pullets that are pay- 
ing for our living today. 'Tis true some do not have success with incu- 
bators, but there are so many different makes of machines on the market 
today, and as they are all the best, so the companies that make them 
claim, you see it would be very hard for a person having little or no prac- 
tical knowledge of the natural laws of incubation and what mechanism is 
required to constitute a good machine, to distinguish the difference be- 
tween a good and a poor machine. 

For best results an incubator must have a good heating device; one 
that will distribute a uniform heat throughout the egg chamber. There 
should be ventilators in the bottom, ends and top, and the operator should 
have good instructions telling how and when to use these ventilators. The 
cause of chicks dying in the shell is the lack of oxygen in the egg chamber 
at pipping time. 

It is just as essential to have a good brooder as it is to have good in- 
cubators; if you try to get along without one I would advise you to try to 
get along without the other, and you should have at least two brooders to 
one incubator. There is where I have made a mistake, to my sorrow — 
crowding too many chicks in one brooder. It will cost a little more at the 
start, but it will pay big dividends in the end. 

Keep the temperature at ninety the first week, and as the chicks grow 
older and stronger, gradually lower the temperature and in a little while 
they can do without artificial heat altogether. We made a large brooder 
ourselves, which is comparatively inexpensive, to put our chicks in after 
they are three or four weeks old. They are too young to wean from a 
brooder at that age, and it keeps them safe from vermin that usually in- 
fest the poultry yards. The little chicks become very much attached to 
their brooder and relv upon it for shelter and protection just as much as 
they would a hen. Do not feed brooder chicks anything but grit for 
thirty,six hours after hatching, and I would advise you to take a dose or 
two yourself, for you may need a little grit to help you through trying 
difficulties that are sure to arise at the end of eight days if you overfeed 
your chicks. In raising brooder chicks always keep in mind that "cleanli- 
ness is next to Godliness," for you cannot raise chicks where lice, mites 
and filth exist. 



60 HOW TO HATCH, BKOOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

Poultry raising appeals strongly to most people because of its adapta- 
bility as a combination with farming. In fact, poultry keeping demands 
the carrying on of some other lines of work inorder to make the most profit 
possible from one's labor. The poultry business requires no great amount 
of capital, and considerable poultry can be kept largely upon what would 
otherwise be a waste; there is much waste about a farm that cannot be 
utilized in any other way as effectively as by poultry, which pick up the 
last grain, whether in the manger or in the refuse and convert it into 
profit. Waste in the feed yard is also converted into profit; there is noth- 
ing that will glean after hogs but poultry. Then when the grain is 
threshed the straw pile will furnish a great deal of picking for them, even 
with the best kind of threshing. In the fall there are small potatoes, cab- 
bages, turnips, squashes, onions, carrots and beets that are not marketable; 
poultry like them and will eat them with a relish. In fact there is nothing 
to take the place of poultry for converting the waste materials on a farm 
into marketable products. There is no longer any question but that poul- 
try is profitable, even when kept aJone, but much more so when the busi- 
ness can be combined with other branches of farm work so that each de- 
partment fits into the other, and the waste of one is utilized by the other. 
Poultry keeping can be engaged in as a side line with almost any business 
which will allow one time enough to give it careful attention each morning 
and evening. Many business men are doing well with small flocks under 
conditions that could hardly be termed favorable, but the hen will give a 
good account of herself under almost any kind of a combination if she is 
given reasonable care. On so many farms you will find the poultry badly 
neglected. The women are generally expected to look after them, and if 
they are not very strong and are doing their housework without any help, 
you will find the hen house full of lice, mites and filth, not a fit habitation 
for any living creature; Husbands, here is where you can lend a helping 
hand and utilize your time on rainy days. Clean out, whitewash, renovate 
and fumigate the hen house, and your wife will be perfectly willing to do 
the rest. It is not necessary to build a castle for chickens, but it is neces- 
sary that the house should be warm, roomy and properly lighted, and keep 
in mind that old adage; it applies to hen houses as well as brooders and 
colony houses. 

I have heard a great many persons express the desire to get onto a 
small farm where they can make a comfortable living without having to 
work too hard, and at the same time live an independent life. Poultry 
offers one of the very best leaders for such a place and it pays as much 
money for the labor and money invested as any kind of business one can 
engage in. On a place of this kind one is able to be at home with one's 
family, and places of this sort offer the best possible conditions for the 
rearing of children. Such a home will always be looked upon with memo- 



CHICKS FKOM DYING IN THE SHELL 61 

ries that grow dearer as the years come and go. The diversity of life on a 
small farm of this kind has a tendency to keep up the interest and make 
the work more attractive and less irksome to the children than where one 
line is followed exclusively. 

During the year 1899 the hens in the United States deposited 1,293,818, 
144 dozen eggs. Now a case of eggs contains thirty dozen, hence it would 
require 43,127,272 cases to hold the annual output. Comparatively few 
people know or realize that the hen produces more wealth every year than 
all the gold and silver mines in the world. The value of the poultry and 
egg product in the United States in 1890 was greater than that of either 
gold or silver produced in the entire world during any previous year since 
the record began in 1493. The poultry and egg products of 1899 exceeded 
in value the pig iron by more than $21,000,000 and the eggs alone were 
valued at $144,286,370 

In 1899 all the wool product in the United States amounted to but 
$45,723,793, while the value of the poultry and eggs amounted to the vast 
sum of $281,178,247. You see the value of wool is less than sixteen per cent 
that of the hen product Isn't it about time for the farmers to begin to 
study the relative market value of the hen to their other products? The 
eggs and poultry sold by the people of the United States in 1899 was 
greater than the value of all animals slaughtered, and was far more than 
the entire oat crop. Would you believe that the hen produced more cash 
than the entire wheat crop of twenty-eight states and territories, including 
Illinois, Iowa, Pennsylvania, Missouri, New Jersey, Texas and Wisconsin? 
It's a fact. She produced a greater value than the corn crop of eighteen 
states and territories, including California, Colorado, Massachusetts, New 
York, North Dakota, Washington, Oregon and Wyoming. The value of 
all the poultry in the United States reserved for' breeding and laying in 
1900 was fixed by competent authority at $70,000,000; the number of fowls 
at 250,681,598, yet from this number of fowls valued at $70,000,000 was 
produced for the market, eggs valued at $144,289,370, and poultry worth 
$136,891,877 a grand total of $281,178,247, or over 400 per cent on the invest- 
ment. Can you beat such a record by engaging in any other legitimate 
business known to commerce? 

Please keep in mind that the above figures apply only to poultry and 
eggs produced on farms. The vast amount produced in villages of the 
country added to the above makes the totals more staggering, besides the 
many millions slaughtered for table use throughout the country, which is 
not considered in the above report, would bring the real value of the 
poultry product up to an overwhelming amount. Now isn't it about time 
for the farmer to give more serious consideration to the patriotic old 
hen, when it is the most profitable, healthy and enjoyable occupation un- 
der the sun. 



62 HOW TO HATCH, BROOD, FEED AND PREVENT 

But my friends, let me say a few words to those of you who contem- 
plate poultry culture for a livelihood: You must have love for the work, 
and an ambition to do that work, and by persistent effort and investigation 
you will acquire knowledge, and after getting practical experience, then 
persevere and you will overcome difficulties, and success will be the result. 
If you will only start right and stick to it I promise you good returns, not 
only in cash, but in health, strength and all that goes to make life worth 
living. 

I could go on at length pointing out its fascinations, pleasures and ad- 
vantages, but time forbids, but will say to the new beginner; I am with 
you in spirit, sympathizing with you in your time of trouble and rejoicing 
with you in your success. I am ever your friend and well wisher. 



INDEX 



Page 

Breeders and Success 35 

Bill for Closed Peed Yard 39 

Brooder for the Chicks, How to Prepare 14 

Culture of Geese 24 

Ducks 20 

Diseases and Their Remedies 41 

Apoplexy 44 

Bone, Charred 43 

Bath, Dust 43 

Crop Bound 47 

Cholera ■. ._ 47 

Diarrhoea, How to Treat It 44 

Dysentery in Chicks, Cure for 42 

Fowls, Over-fat 43 

Poultry, Good Tonic for 43 

Grit for 43 

Roup, Cure for 48 

Scaly Legs, Cure for 47 

Early Hatched Chickens are Best 19 

Find a Good Market and Meet Its Demands 32 

Feeding Hens for Egg Production in Winter 28 

Feed Yard, Bill for 39 

Grow Speltz for Your Poultry ' 35 

Geese, Culture of 24 

Give Your Boys and Girls a Chance 52-53 

How to Prevent Chicks From Dying 11 

How and What to Feed Brooder Chicks 17 

How to Pip the Egg 13 

How to Prepare the Brooder for the Chicks 14 

How to Hatch Ducks by Incubation 20 

How and What to Feed Ducks 21 

How to Start Your Incubators 7 

How to Prepare Young Cockerels for Market , 32 

How to Build a Cheap Poultry House 37 

Introductory ■ 3 

Leghorns Not Good Setters 35 

Mrs. Johnson's Poultry Compound 41 

Directions for Preparing 41 

Directions for Using- 42 



64 INDEX 

Mrs. Johnson's Method of Forcing a Molt 29 

Moisture and When to Introduce It 12 

Mating, Breeding and Rearing Turkeys 22 

Molting 29 

Poultry Industry 37 

Proper Temperature for Successful Incubation 8 

Poultry Culture, Incubators, Brooders 58-61 

Poultry Hints 49-51 

Poultry House 37 

Recipe for Keeping Eggs 36 

Removing Chicks to the Brooder 15 

Saving Eggs for Incubation 5 

Testing the Eggs to Set 6 

Testing Eggs for Fertility 6 

Turning and Cooling the Egg 9 

The White of the Egg Makes the Chick 31 

Talk on Incubators and Brooders 36 

Turkeys 22 

Testimonial Letters to Mrs. Rebecca Johnson 54-56 

Things to Remember 57 

Ventilation and How to Prevent Chicks From Dying in the Shell. 11 

When to Remove Chicks to the Brooder 15 

Which is the Best General Purpose Fowl? 28 

Young Cockerels 32 



INDEX TO ILLUSTRATIONS 

Page 

Portrait of Mrs. Johnson Frontispiece 

Buff Cochins 38 

Black Langshans 45 

Bronze Turkeys 23 

Barred Plymouth Rocks 26 

Feed Yard and Brooders 41 

Light Brahmas 46 

Mrs. Johnson's 1087 Chick Hatch 33 

Mrs. Johnson and Little Daughters and Their Ducks : 52 

Mammoth Imperial Pekin Ducks 21 

Rose Comb Brown Leghorns 34 

Silver Laced Wyandottes 27 

Single Comb Brown Leghorns 33 

Toulouse Geese 25 



ESTABLISHED J 870 



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clCCOUOL 5^* (£• ^* (^* (£• (£• (£• 



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you 
€99$* 



Lots of them, because hens 

fed green bone fresh cut, 

lay more eggs, more fertile 

eggs and produce better 

hatches, earlier broilers and 

heavier market birds. It gives the hen the protein and other egg 

elements she needs to keep up her work. If you feed green cut bone> 

you'll need a 



MANN'S 



LATEST MODEL 
BONE CUTTER 



The one that cuts all the bone, meat and adhering gristle, clean, fast 
and fine. Mann's has open hopper, specially tempered knives and 
self-adjusting automatic feed that adapts the cutting to the strength 
of the operator. It never clogs and leaves no uncut slivers nor 
chunks. Mann's is Sold on Ten Days Free Trial. No money in 
advance. 

Write jor free illustrated catalog. 

F. W. Mann Co., Hilford, Hass. 

Box 192 



The Author's success is partly due to a Mann Bone Cutter. 



Payne's Alfalfa Feeds 



TO GET THE BEST RESULTS YOU 
MUST USE THE VERY BEST FEED 



Ask for 

Poultry <£ 
Pointers 

And 

Uncle 
Charlie's 

Little 

Chick 

Talk 



Alfalfa Feeds 



PAYNE'S PURE ALFALFA MEAL 
PAYNE'S POULTRY MASH 



A 



Grain Feeds 



PAYNE'S CHICK FEED 
PAYNE'S HEN FEED^ 



ALFALMO No. 33, ALFALMO SWINE FEED 

For Fattening Cattle For Hogs 

ALFALFA MEAL CO. 

Omaha, Neb. 



This is the feed I use to take the place of grass for egg production in winter. 
—The Author. 









Poultry^ 
Charcoal 

is the greatest 
Natural To n ic 
and Invigorator 
ever produced & 


mm 




It is made from hard wood, thoroughly burned, then crushed 
screened, and put up in twenty-five-pound sacks. 

We make it in three sizes — No. 1, Course, for large fowls; No. 2 
Medium, for growing birds, and No. 3, Fine, for young chicks and 
for mixing in soft feed. * 

Every bird needs a quantity of Charcoal to keep it in the best oi 
condition, therefore it will pay you to lay in a stock and keep it con- 
stantly before yours. 

No. i Size ..$1.75 per 100 lbs. 

No. 2 Size $1-75 per 100 lbs. 

No. 3 Size $2.00 per 100 lbs. 

F. O. B. Pittsburg 

Send for our circular of dependable Poultry Supplies, and let us 
quote you interesting prices on anything you may want. 

STAPLER POULTRY SUPPLY COMPANY 

726 Arrott Power Building 
PITTSBURG, PA. 





I can recommend this charcoal as the best I have ever used— The'Atxthor. 



ma 29 1906 



7R sk*? >/r «T"®^C3 X 













